CH:17 Stress and Health

Stress is an arousal of one’s mind and body in response to demands made upon them. Stress can have several responses and even physical effects followed by psychological factors and health.  For this, there are several ways of coping with it. Stress is actually really common which is why it is of concern. In fact most students seek counseling because of stress. Stress is seen in the everyday life with work and other assignments. 

 One may think that all stress is bad, however not all of it is indeed bad. Positive stress is called eustress while a negative stress is a distress. The origin of stress weather it is an event or situation, is called a stressor. There are several types of stressors. These are frustration-being blocked from obtaining a goal, daily hassles-stresses from everyday life, life changes-such as moving, serious illness, or death in a family, and conflict-being pulled into two directions by opposing forces. There are several types of conflicts, which include avoidance-avoidance, approach-avoidance, and multiple approach-avoidance conflict.

Stress has many responses. People respond to stress differently. Also the stress of an event depends on the situation. Responses to stress include self-efficacy expectations (beliefs that people have that they can accomplish something), psychological hardiness (personality characteristics that helps people withstand stress), social support (the presence and interests of others help certain people cope with stress), predictability (ability to predict a stressor), and a sense of humour towards the stress. There are also several physical effects caused due to stress. The body responds toward stress with a response called General adaptation syndrome, which has three stages. These are the alarm reaction, which is initiated when a stressor is perceived, the resistance stage where people try to deal with the stressor, and the exhaustion stage where one would continue if we have not yet coped with stress in the resistance stage. Stress also affects the immune system negatively because when undergoing stress we produce steroids, and these steroids interfere with the formation of antibodies, which are crucial for the immune system. Psychological Factors and health are also included. Due to the tension caused by stress, one tends to feel headaches. Cancer could be a problem because of stress due to the role of the immune system explained before.

People cope with stress in several ways. One of this ways is called defensive coping, which is not exactly a good way to cope with stress. These include substance abuse, aggression, withdrawal, suicide, and defense mechanisms. A good way to cope with stress is with active coping, which involves changing the environment or situation to remove stressors. These include changing stressful thoughts, relaxation, and exercise.

As seen, stress can be something quite serious. It can affect our body health as well as our psychological health. Not only that. Many people today think they cope with stress all right but they may be wrong. They may be coping defensively, which is not exactly the healthiest way to deal with stress. Sometimes these methods are worst than the stress. Learning how to live with stress in a healthy way is important because stress will always be there, it is just the way we view it. 

Stress seen where the stressor is that the person has a lot of assignments. 

Ch: 15 Reflection on Psychological Tests

Jose was responsible for presenting chapter 15 or psychological tests. He did present and his presentation was well done because of a variety of aspects. These are the following. His presentation was interesting and informative. He was also serious during the presentation, and overall the presentation was well done.

One reason I liked this presentation is because of the information provided. The information showed what psychological tests were and what one could find out with these tests. One can measure abilities, interest, and achievement. This also made me have insights. One of my insights is that once my sister was undecided for what she wanted to study in college. Due to this, she took a psychological test, more specifically an aptitude test to find out what she could be in life. She was guided by her results and has been doing all right. One can also measure personality through personality tests such as Rorschach inkblot test, which is a projective one or a MMPI, which is an objective one. One of my insights here was that once I watched a movie called The Watchmen. One of the characters in this film, whose name is Rorschach, wears a mask with inkblots that have a history behind them. He is then asked to take this Rorschach test.  The information over all provided was accurate.

Jose in this presentation was serious showing the dedication put into this project. In general he presented well with a good volume as well as a good interaction with the classroom.

This presentation was very good as mentioned before. It was complete because of the aspects mentioned. It had the chance to have several insights. This means that I learned this material well. Jose as always presented this information really well, which of course helps in the remembering part. 


The character I was talking about related to the Rorschach Test. 

CH:15 Psychological Tests

Psychological tests asses abilities, feelings, attitudes, and behaviors.  These can help people make important decisions . For these tests to be useful and accurate, these have to have certain characteristics. It has to be standardized which means it is administered and scored the same way every time. The test score has to be the same or nearly the same for it to be reliable. Validity scales involve questions that if answered in a certain way; the psychologists can know that the test is answered honestly. Norms are designed to tell administrators which test scores are high, low or averaged.

Psychological tests can measure achievement, abilities, and interests. Achievement tests are a type of psychological tests that measure people’s skills and the knowledge they have in specific academic areas. Aptitude tests are used to know if someone would to well in a given area. It is important to know that aptitude tests and achievement tests are not the same. To help people determine if their interests are similar to the interests of people in various lines of work, psychologists use vocational interest inventories. Two famous interest inventories are the Kuder Preference records- known for the forced choice format (Have to chose and answer, even if none of them fit the test taker’s interest), and the Strong-Campbell Interest Inventory-comparing the test taker’s interest to the interests of people who are successful and enjoy in several kinds of work.

Other types of psychological tests can measure personality. There are objective tests which introduce the test takers with standardized groups of test items in a questionnaire form. In these tests true and false questions are present where test takers are limited to a specific choice. These include famous tests like the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Test and the California Psychological Inventory. There are also projective tests, which have no specific answers. These use an open-ended format. An example of one of these tests is the Rorschach Inkblot Test where random inkblots with no specific form are presented and one has to say what they see. Another projective test is the Thematic Apperception Test where and image is presented and one has to say what they interpret.

Taking tests can be difficult and stressful. Due to this there are several tips. One must first gather adequate information. One must also practice. Practice makes perfect. Also being test wise is really important like following directions carefully. Also bringing adequate equipment for the test.  When doing multiple-choice questions one must try answering the question without looking at the options, consider every possible choice, look for answers that are opposite, and looking for the best choice listed. When doing true and false questions one must take into consideration that every detail from the question has to be true. In short answer questions one must focus on answering the question in a complete but concise way. To overcome test anxiety one must be prepared which will create confidence.

Psychological tests are important in life because we can find out of what we want and what we are.  We can find out how we behave. We can also find out about our personality and about the skills we are good at. In fact, many students nowadays use psychological tests to guide them on what they are going to do in their life. Several of these tests measure a lot of things, which makes them quite complete.

Example of The Rorschach Inkblot Test 

CH:16 Gender Roles

A gender is the sex of a person weather it is male or female. Gender roles are the accepted social expectations about how males and females should behave. There are several gender differences and gender typing. Surprisingly several variations in gender roles are also present. Gender roles are really important because they have shaped us and made us who we are today.

Due to the gender roles, several gender stereotypes have emerged. These are fixed beliefs about how men and women have to behave. These are normally linked to traditional views of men as the source of income and women as people who take care of the home. Some of these include that women are more emotive and men more independent and logical.

Of course, there are gender differences. Some of these obvious differences is that both have different reproductive organs. There are also differences in cognitive abilities. Men seem to preform better in math than women. This can be seen in SAT ranges. Women on the other hand tend to perform better in reading and writing. This is not true for every individual. Another common stereotype is that of the strong silent man, where women talk more than men do, which according to researchers is actually true. However, when men enter school, they dominate classroom discussions.  Men tend to talk less than women about their feelings and personal experiences. Women often talk about intimate matters. Also several physical features are appealing on both genders, which is quite odd. Men are  more interested in physical characteristics while women pay more close attention to professional status, consideration, and kindness.

Gender typing are theories of why there are gender roles. Children as young as two years old develop ideas of what they consider characteristics of males and females. The specialization of carrying different functions in the brain is called lateralization. This occurs during fetal development and is influenced by sex hormones. Therefore lateralization occurs differently in boys and girls. Testosterones make you grow more of a right brain. Gender roles can be explained in terms of gender identification. According to Freud, boys come to identity to their fathers, and girls with their mothers. He also said that at the beginning we seek the attention of the opposite sex parent and perceive the same sex parent as rival for attention. This seems to be a false theory. According to social learning theory, gender role behavior, like any other behavior, is acquired through two different learning processes. These are reinforcement and modeling. Babies are treated according to their sex and parents teach them how they expect to behave.

Surprisingly, gender roles not only vary through time, but they also vary from culture to culture. Gender roles have varied through time. For example, women were supposed to do only the house chores and nurturing while today now they are entitled to have jobs. Gender roles also change in different cultures. Studies in tribes show that in some places, men and women are equally aggressive. Women looked down on nurturing babies because it interposed with going battling. There were tribes where men and women had the same roles.

  

There are several differences between genders that make us different. These are both psychological and physical. It is also fascinating to know where gender roles are originated and even more surprising that gender roles change in different locations. We would be completely different people if it weren’t because of the gender roles because there would be no guide to follow. People have also changed according to gender roles.  

Stereotypes of gender roles.