Computerized interventions can meet needs of numerous employees at a cost between 1/3 and 1/6 less than traditional behavioral therapy. They provide services that:
* Are available 24 hours a day  
* Don't require scheduling coordination or travel time
* Do not force ambivalent individuals to meet face-to-face w others 
* Are self-paced 
* Have potential to reach high number of individuals 
* Foster a sense of independence 
* Highly cost effective 

Method 2: Using computers in stress-management interventions



According to a meta-analysis of 72 studies, occupational health promotion programs associated with lower levels of absenteeism and healthcare costs - the most widely validated program being the Abbreviated Progressive Relaxation Training (APRT). APRT is relaxation training conducted by a group leader in 2-minute "mini-relaxations." Research shows APRT is:
- Effective in reducing perceived stress and physiologically measured stress.
- Good for reducing perceived stress equivalent to that of employees taught 20-minute APRT
- More likely to encourage practicing relaxation exercise 1 month after training


Method 1: Worksite stress-management interventions


Stress-management workplace intervention is identical for individuals in CB (computer-based) and IP (traditional in-person based) groups, included training in abbreviated progressive relaxation, discussion of time management techniques, and homework assignments encouraging participants to practice variety of stress-reducing activities. Both interventions take place over 2 week time periods.


Implementing Stress-management Intervention in the Workplace

Attrition refers to the loss of participants during a study. This is a particularly significant issue in longitudinal research, where dropout rates are often high and tend to increase as the study progresses over time. Participants may leave a study for numerous reasons, including major life events like moving, marriage, illness, or death, or they may simply decide to stop participating. This reduction in participants can threaten a study's validity, introduce bias, and weaken the power of its statistical conclusions.

Attrition

Stress reduction in the workplace can be done through group-based (instructor-lead) or computer-based (computer-presented format) intervention. However, compliance is more problematic in computer-based intervention since there is limited human supervision online, while individuals in clinician-guided mental health experienced greater improvement and satisfaction than computer-guided groups.

Boston University

The body's response to stressors from within the body or from the environment. 

Stress (Psychological Stress)

Stress is a process through which an individual perceives and responds to events, known as stressors, that they appraise as overwhelming or threatening to their well-being. This cognitive appraisal of the event and one's ability to cope with it is a key determinant of the resulting physiological or psychological strain. While often viewed negatively, stress can also be an adaptive response to challenging situations.

Stress

Eisen, K. P., Allen, G. J., Bollash, M., & Pescatello, L. S. (2008). Stress management in the workplace: A comparison of a computer-based and an in-person stress-management intervention. Computers in Human Behavior, 24(2), 486–496. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2007.02.003


Stress management in the workplace: A comparison of a computer-based and an in-person stress-management intervention

When a paper you read mentions a form of stress, add it here as a bullet point, then create a concept child node defining it. Also make sure to add your reference to this node.
- Emotional Stress
- Stress caused via media
- Climate Grief
- Oxidative Stress
- Covid-19 Pandemic Stress
- Time Stress
- Anticipatory Stress
- Situational Stress
- Encounter Stress
- Workplace/Academia Stress
- Gender-related Stress
- Chronic illness and Stress
- Physical stress
- Psychological stress
- Psychosocial stress
- Psycho-spiritual stress
- Generational stress/ Generational trauma

Types of Stress

Group-based vs. Computer-based Stress-management Intervention

Men and women are at differential risk for mental illnesses. Different forms of response/adaptation could predispose men and women to different illnesses and health problems, such as psychophysiological differences between men and women in context of stress




Gender, Stress, and Health

Stress can be broken up into several descriptive levels.
- Acute Stress
- Episodic Stress
- Chronic Acute Stress

Levels of Stress

Researchers have agreed that there are unhealthy and healthy ways of managing stress.

Ways of Coping with Stress

 Psychological responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have been found to highly correlate with fear and stress. This high association leads to different responding behaviors. The overwhelming amount of data is creating a need to find a way to best measure amounts of stress and fear.

The Psychological Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic Associated with Stress and Fear

The stress in the context of the pandemic promotes more severe Covid-19 symptoms and diminishes antibody response to vaccination.

Stress and Immunity to Covid-19

An emerging body of literature on stress, coping, and health among African American women identify strength as a factor that may exacerbate the influence of stress on health outcomes in this population. Although strength can be a positive attribute, behaviors related to strength (e.g., emotional suppression, extraordinary caregiving, and self-care postponement) may jeopardize health.

Health Disparities Related to Stress and Strength among African American Women

Distress in the four D's looks at people's perceptions of the dysfunction in an individual’s life, whether or not the person feels particularly distressed by it. However, dysfunction and distress may not always go hand in hand together.

Distress

There are various ways one can manage and regular their stress. This may include:
- Coping 
- Social support
- Perceived control
- Stress reduction techniques
- Virtual reality stress treatment

Regulation of Stress

Stress triggers a wide range of reactions, which can be grouped into three main categories: physiological, cognitive, and behavioral. These responses encompass the various ways individuals react to stressful experiences.

Categorization of Stress Responses

When individuals perceive life events as stressful, employing effective coping strategies becomes essential for managing the stress.

The Necessity of Coping for Stress Management

Research suggests that stress affects immunology mainly through autonomic nerves innervating lymphoid tissue, hormone-mediated alteration of immune cells, or adoption of coping behaviors.

Stress and Immunology

- Negative Life Events 
- Perceived Stress
- Negative Affect
- Social Isolation
- Socioeconomic Status

Factors contributing to Stress

Stress Hormones

- Cholesterol levels are used to identify coronary heart disease 
  - Could lead to atherosclerosis, which is plaque buildup in arteries
- Lipid levels increase in response to stress
- Increased cholesterol in the blood poses a risk for CHD, which then increases its permeability through the innermost layer of the blood vessel wall

Stress and Lipids

The Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course is a program where one is taught multiple practices of how to be accepting and non-judgemental of their present experiences or thoughts. In addition, individuals who participate in this course are taught mindfulness practices, such as being more mindful when eating or taking a walk and being more attentive with their breathing and body sensations. These practices often lead individuals to be more wise with how they respond to their external circumstances.

Critical Skill To Combat Stress Through Mindfulness

Stress is different for everyone as it is based on one's personality. Some stressors may affect some a lot more than others. Primary triggers that cause stress for most people externally consists of external related stress.

Causations of Stress

Stress can impact one's life mentally, emotionally, behaviorally, and physically. As many experiences stress differently, some may experience only a few or more symptoms in these categories.

Symptoms of Stress

Chronic and Acute Stress

Stress is a complex phenomenon that affects individuals in various ways. The study of stress has led to the development of several theories that attempt to explain its causes and effects.

Theories of stress

- Positive
- Tolerable
- Toxic
- Physiological
- Cognitive
- Behavioral

Types of Stress Responses

References for Stress

Previous research has illustrated that emotional processing plays a role in moral decision making. Brain areas such as the amygdala, hippocampus, the anterior cingulate cortex, and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which play important roles in emotional processing when activated, also can potentially play a role in moral decision making. By extension, stress has been seen to play a role as well. 

Impact of Stress on Moral Decision-Making: Emotional Processing 

When trauma is experienced, the brain recognizes it as a threat and therefore activates a neurobiological stress response. Though this stress response can be beneficial in the moment to help protect a person from danger, repeated exposure to stress/trauma and thus, the repeated, overactivation of a neurobiological stess response, can negatively affect the mind and body. Exposure to traumatic stress during childhood can damage and/or alter a child's brain as it is developing. Such damage can affect their ability to learn in school and even affect them into adulthood. 


Childhood Traumatic Stress 

Dysfunctional attitudes are mostly caused by stressful life events. It can develop in people with no psychological disorders and in people with psychological disorders such as depression and anxiety when they encounter too much stress. 

Dysfunctional Attitudes and Stress

3 Types of Stress Responses

- Immunoprotective
- Immunoregulatory/inhibitory
- Immunopathological

3 Types of Stress Effects on Immunity 

Reference for Stress Sensitization Model

Stress sensitization model is a term used to describe the theory that suggests that a person might become sensitized to stress over the course of time to the point where successive episodes only require a decreasing amount of stress to trigger them. 

Stress Sensitization Model 

Academic stress refers to the stress students experience related to school. It can be as a result of a heavy workload and/or due to the pressure to perform well. 

Academic Stress 

The stress response is a complex and coordinated set of physiological reactions that the body activates when needed. These reactions are adaptive, preparing an individual to cope with situations perceived as dangerous or threatening.

Stress Response

Contributors to Stress Research and Understanding

Refers to perceived threatening or demanding stimuli, and in turn initiating the stress process.

Stressors

There are differences in the stress level of demographic groups with variances in the following characteristics:

- Sex
- Age
- Race
- Education
- Employment
- Income ($US)

Stress and Demographics

Defining stress with precision is challenging because it is a fairly vague and complex concept. This difficulty in establishing a single, universally accepted definition has led to the development of several different conceptualizations, including stimulus-based, response-based, and appraisal-based definitions, as well as the distinction between good and bad stress.

The Challenge of Defining Stress

Contrary to its common negative association, stress can function as a beneficial force. It often serves as a key motivator for individuals to engage in actions that are in their own best interest, such as preparing for exams, seeking regular medical care, exercising, and striving for excellence in the workplace.

Beneficial Aspects of Stress

Profoundly negative health consequences can arise when stress becomes extreme or chronic. This prolonged stress is a significant contributor to the onset and progression of various psychological disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder and major depressive disorder, as well as a wide range of physical illnesses and diseases.

Negative Health Consequences of Chronic and Extreme Stress

The study of stress and illness explores the relationship between psychological stress and physical health, examining how stress can contribute to the onset or worsening of various diseases.

Stress and Illness

The Social Readjustment Rating Scale is a self-report questionnaire used to operationally define stress. It requires individuals to identify stressful life events they have experienced in the past year, assigning specific points based on the severity of each event—such as a divorce ($$73$$ points) or changing jobs ($$36$$ points)—to calculate a total stress score.

Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS)

The Perceived Stress Scale is a specific operational definition utilized to quantify the abstract concept of stress. It serves as a self-report questionnaire where individuals provide scores that correspond to their level of perceived stress, thus transforming a theoretical variable into an observable and measurable format.

Perceived Stress Scale

Stress can be operationally defined using various physiological measures, beyond just self-report questionnaires. Researchers can quantify the stress response by recording specific biological variables within the body, such as elevated blood pressure levels or increased concentrations of the stress hormone cortisol.

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