Happiness Two Psychological Phenomena: Adaptation and Comparison Happiness and Prior Experience Adaptation-level phenomenon Happiness and others’ attainments Relative deprivation

Adaptation level phenomenon The tendency to judge various stimuli relative to those we have previously experienced TV example

Relative deprivation The perception that we are worse off relative to those with whom we compare ourselves

Happiness Predictors of Happiness

Brain storm ways to get past anger Changing thoughts Not taking things personally Understanding the context Others?

Introduction Health psychology Behavioral medicine

Stress and Illness Stress Stress appraisal

Stress Not just a stimulus or a response The process by which we perceive and respond to certain events called stressors, that we appraise as threatening or challenging

Walter Cannon First discussed the stress response – fight or flight Sympathetic nervous system releases ephinephrine and norepinephrine Increase heartrate and respiration Diverts blood from digestion to the skelatal muscles, dulls pain Releases sugar and fat from the body’s stores

Stress and Illness The Stress Response System Selye’s general adaptation syndrome (GAS) Alarm Resistance exhaustion

Tip Seyle’s three stages ARE a GAS

Stress and Illness General Adaptation Syndrome

Stress and Illness General Adaptation Syndrome

Stress and Illness General Adaptation Syndrome

Stress and Illness General Adaptation Syndrome

Other responses Freeze – paralyzed - withdraw, pull back, conserve Tend and befriend – more women – may be because of oxytocin – a stress moderating hormone associated with pair bonding in animals

Telomeres Shorter bits of DNA at the ends of their chromosomes. Cell can’t divide if these get too short – the cells die Happens after prolonged stress

Stress and Illness Stressful Life Events Catastrophes Significant life changes Daily hassles

Stress and the Heart Coronary heart disease Type A versus Type B

Other conditions that lead to heart problems Anger Pessimism Depression

Psychosomatic Older term – people often thought “just in your head” Today psychoneuroimmunology PNI Psychophysiological illnesses (hypertension and some headaches)

Stress and Susceptibility to Disease Psychophysiological illnesses Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) Lymphocytes B lymphocytes T lymphocytes Stress and AIDS Stress and Cancer