General Adaptation Model Of Stress

Stress is a physiological response to a moment of tension and excessive pressure resulting in emotional strain. A term commonly associated with this is the fight or flight response in which the body reacts to moments of stress, otherwise known as high arousal, with the response of removal from the unpleasant situation or retaliation in the presence of the stimulus. Adrenaline and cortisol are the key hormones in stress, where adrenaline is secreted to create a rise in blood circulation and cortisol is produced to reduce the potential for inflammation. Recent studies have suggested that the correlation between stress and psychological and physical effects is at an increasing high, especially in adolescents, where these high arousal stressors
This happens when “the adrenal gland, which sits on top of your kidneys, releases the hormone in response to some stressors” which “releases glucose into the body” (Galvan, 2014), providing energy for the fight or flight response. It is proposed by Hans Selye that there is a process known as General Adaptation Syndrome where “his model states that an event that threatens an organism’s well-being (a stressor) leads to a three-stage bodily response” (Selye, 2011). The Alarm stage involves the body’s physiological response when the sympathetic nervous system or “fight or flight response” is activated, where hormones are rapidly produced in the bloodstream to increase the body’s ability to respond to the stressor. The Resistance stage comprises of the
It is often suggested that a beneficial method to reduce stress prior to stressful situations such as exams, tests and presentation is practicing meditation as it reduces the production of stress hormones, thus, allowing students to perform at an optimal level. It is put forth that “some studies show that mindfulness based practices like yoga and meditation, can reduce stress” (DNews, 2015) through their ability to balance brain activity and create clear thinking and reasoning, achieving an optimal level of arousal in cognitive school tasks. According to Elizabeth Owen, who practices mindfulness techniques as a method of mind transformation, “meditation ‘re-sets’ the mind to a calm, peaceful state which is both beneficial for internal happiness and also the ability to respond to daily life tasks” (Owen, 2017). Another method to reduce stress if simpler methods do not work is seeking help from professionals such as psychologists who can initiate Cognitive Behaviour Therapy which “aims to help a person identify and challenge unhelpful thoughts and to learn practical self-help strategies” (Department of Health & Human Services, 2016), teaching people to cope with an unpleasant stimulus such as stress and reduce negative emotions