- In the first stage, man learns that what is stress?
- In the second stage he learns the method of removing or reducing stress, practice is also done by him in this work.
- In the last stage, he practices of the management methods in the targeted stressful situations and monitor the effect of it.
An important program based on these three stages is developed in America, which is called ‘Combat Stress Now’, which is successfully used in those schools where students feel complication in facing with the stress of educated life.
According to Lehrer and Wollfolk,1993 many techniques of management have been divided into two parts:
- Individual Approach
- Environmental Change Approach
The techniques that come under both of these approach are following described:
(a) Individual Approach—Under it special work is done on mainly men for the management stress, under it two techniques are put:
- Arousal Reduction—In this method , man is trained to the relaxation of muscles. And sometimes the support of biofeedback is also taken. It is seen that after getting the training of this man (1988)began to use this talent slowly in his real life for reducing the stress. Davidson and Thomson have said, after doing the study of this that man can get the stable advantage of this training, when he does continue practice of this type of relaxation.
- Cognitive Restructuring—The founders of this method are Meichambaunm, 1977; Ellis,1962 and Beck. This is such a techniques in which it is tried to change the belief system of man so that he may present the right and appropriate detail of experiences of life and can bring changes in his clear behavior and emotion, Because of such belief, man has many expectations with others and even himself, and becomes stressful. By the cognitive restructuring techniques, he enables to put away such belief from himself and put another in place of that. Folkman and Lazarus (1984) have accepted this fact in his study.
- Behavioral Skill Training—This is such a method of stress management, man is trained with some such skill, related to behavior, by using that he can reduce his stress. As- time management is such a skill, by learning this, man can reduce his day to day stress. Often it is seen that man has to do more work in limited time, which is a cause of stress, in the time management, man is trained how he can deal with such situations. it is evident that some special behavioral skills are taught to man, by which he could control day to day stress.
- Biofeedback—In the decade 1970, a new technique became popular, which is called biofeedback. Biofeedback is such a specific technique, by which the physiological aspects of stress can be controlled and monitored. In which feedback is given about the function of any special internal part of man. Which is generally out of conscious control of man, man has to control it by recognizing it, as the connection of disease can be established with such a machine, which can change the hearts beat into tone, so that man could understand this how much rapidly heart is beating. In the process of trial and error, man learns to control over this autonomic response slowly. Now man can feel it that not paying attention on the heart beats, if the attention is focused on other things, by this his heart beats can be easily reduced.
- Relaxation Techniques—There are many relaxation techniques, which are used for reducing stress by man when man is in the stage of relaxation, there is less arousal in the body of man. Which means man does not want to react towards the stress. In this way man takes his body into the pleasant stage from the lower stage. There are many relaxation methods, which is used by man for reducing stress. In which important are following:
- According to Everly (1989)—one aspect of relaxation technique is that in which there is projective relaxation of different muscles of body. Here imagination is this, because tension and anxiety is related to the muscles stress so the feeling of stress and anxiety can be coped by reducing the stress of muscles. In the projective relaxation, man putting some muscles of body in sequence, specially first man relax the muscles of face by starting from lower parts of muscles. Until body comes in the stage of complete relaxation, the feeling of arousing peace is practiced in man, then he developed less stressful tendency.
- The second version of relaxation technique is controlled breathing. Because the stage of relaxation is related to controlled breathing, so we can develop relaxation in man by arousing this type of breathing pattern, first man takes a long breathe, by which fresh air goes in the lungs of man. After taking long breathe within 10 minutes, man takes short breathe, stress arousing pain is controlled after adapting this process. This fact is confirmed by the studies of Turk and his colleagues and Weisenberg, 1977.
This fact has supported by some studies, which by putting relaxation techniques in continue practice it helps a lot in developing immune system. Kiecolt- Glaser and his colleagues (1984) studied in which some medical students of first year were divided in two groups, relaxation group and comparison group. The students of relaxation group were trained in relaxation session before 5 to 10 months before the starting the examination, training was not given to comparison group. During the time of examination defects were seen in the work of immune system of both of the groups, means the ratio of t cells were less, but stress was felt less by the students of relaxation group in this group the member, who practice more in the relaxation session, t cells were found in them more than the student, who did not practice in the relaxation session. It is identified from this study that relaxation reduces anxiety and stress. Kiecolt- Glaser, 1985 did other experiment in which 45 old men were divided into three groups, relaxation training is given to one group, social contact is provided to second group and third group was kept under control group. Training was given three times to first two groups in a weak till one month. It was seen after finishing month, there was enough improvement in the works of immune system of relaxation group, which tells himself that the clear effect of it seen by doing continue practice of it.
(b) Environmental Changes Approach—In the individual approach, those techniques are forced, which prepares a man for doing compromise with the special environment, but in the environmental approach, accepting environment as a problem it is tried to reduce stress by doing some changes in it. The role of social support is considered important in it. Cohen and Wills (1985) have called two types of changes- Structure social support and functional social support. Structure social support means by the network, which is related to the social support, as- numbers of friends on the occasion of marriage. Functional social support means, by the qualities of men, as – does a man has this faith that he can call his relative in the bad time. If yes, it will be considered that man has got functional social support. It has been cleared by the study of Goodnow and Grady (1990) and Seeman and Seeme (1990) that tension is creates by low social support and many physical and mental diseases are produced by it. In this approach, man is trained in this way by which can make his social circle strong and changes the environment of his surrounds in which stress is not presented. In this field the contribution done by community psychologists is admirable.
It can be concluded that there are many techniques of stress management, a man can spend stress less life by using these methods properly.
Summary
- Stress is a big problem of our society. It is known from modern researches that stress is the cause of the illness of 75% people.
- Some psychologists have tried to understand the stress, as the factors of stimulus and have said that any event or situation that insists a man for doing abnormal responses is called stress. Events as- earthquake, leaving the job, destroy the business, death of loving person are the main events, which create stress in a man. Such materials, social and environmental factors, which create stress, are called stressor.
- Some psychologists have tried to explain the stress as a response.
- The third batch of psychologists, who defined stress not only as a stimulus not as a response but also tried to define it on the basis of its relationship. This approach is called transactional approach. Psychologists consider it that some events or situation are definitely such, which are stressful for men. There are some situations and events which can create stress in some men, hence stress can not be defined meaningfully as a stimulus in the same way the responses of stressful events, even that physiological responses can be affected easily.
- When a man is under stress, he feels it and does response toward it.
- Psychological Reactions-there are many kinds of physiological and psychological reactions in stress. In other words, disruption is found in the physiological works of man in stress.
- A man does physiological reactions towards the situation or stimulus causing stress. Often it is seen that after surrounded by the stressful situation, the stomach of man is disturbed and heart beats become abnormal and changes in nerves system. All these are the example of physiological reactions.
- As we know man does not only do one reaction but different reactions towards the stress. In other words, there is individual differences in the reactions that are done towards the stress. Psychologists have tried to understand the causes of this individual difference. According to their consideration following factors are such as by which reactions are influenced— (1) Prior Experience (2) Social Support (3) Predictability and Control (4) Cognitive Factors (5) Type ‘A’ Personality.
- Scientist have done successful effort for the measurement of stress, and they have described four important methods for this— (1) Self-Report Method (2) Behavioral Methods (3) Physiological Methods.
- How does stress arouse in the mind of man, psychologists have done deep study of it. And a schedule of many factors has been prepared by which tension arouse in man, such factors are following— (1) Stressful Events of Life (2) Conflicts of Motives (3) Daily Hassles (4) Work Related Sources (5) Environmental Sources.
- Whatever may be the causes for stress, but it lays bad effect on the emotional and physiological health of man. Hence psychologists have thought seriously on the strategies of coping it. Reducing the related behavior of stress is called coping behavior. Coping behavior has been defined by the psychologists in different ways, as- Goodstein and Lanyon have defined the coping behavior in this way: “By coping we mean the degree to which individuals are able to meet and master at least three kinds of challenges to their existence: (1) direct challenges from the physical environment (2) challenges stemming from their physical limitation (3) interpersonal challenges.”
- The most important cause among them is the seriousness of stress or its newness. Health psychologists have paid attention on some methods for facing such situation. It will be appropriate to ask here before thinking on those methods. What is stress management? Stress management means by such programs, in which man is asked about the sources of stress and education is given him about the scientific and modern way of facing it. Not only is this practice of the skill, for reducing stress also done here.
