It activates the body’s parasympathetic nervous system, which slows breathing and heart rate as well as increasing digestion.
The advantage of the approach is it is quicker and cheaper than a standard intervention.
Even before the pandemic, this age group were reporting record levels of levels.
Research into previous mass traumas reveals the best ways of coping with stress of COVID-19.
Research into previous mass traumas reveals the best ways of coping with stress of COVID-19.
Coping activities that increase the sense of control, coherence and connectedness are key to dealing with COVID-19 stress, new research concludes.
Typical coping activities include checking in with friends and loved ones, filtering news intake and planning daily activities.
All of these are ways of regaining control.
Planning daily activities, for example, helps reduce the sensation of drifting along without structure or purpose.
Other techniques that help regain control include making post-pandemic plans and journaling.
Feeling in control is one important way of coping, along with increasing coherence and connectedness, the researchers explain.
Increasing the sense of coherence means trying to make more sense of the world.
One way of doing this is to practice ‘acceptance-based coping’.
This involves using mindfulness to observe fears, anxieties and other emotional responses as they pass through the brain.
Finally, connectedness can be difficult to achieve given social distancing regulations.
However videoconferencing, telephone calls and social media can all help to keep in touch with others.
Even meditating by oneself, directing loving kindness towards the self can help increase the sense of connection to others.
Part of being compassionate towards the self is accepting that our own struggles are connected to others as we are going through the same thing together.
All these strategies have been found to help people deal with stress and bounce back.
These recommendations were inspired by research into how people dealt with other mass traumas, such as the 9/11 terror attacks.
Mr Craig Polizzi, the study’s first author, said:
“We also drew inspiration from our previous work with clients who have experienced traumas and how they have coped with traumatic events.”
People cope with traumas in different ways, so the strategies they use should be personalised, Mr Polizzi said:
“People are unique and the way they cope should be consistent with their needs and values.”
In the future, the research team hope to look at what psychological strategies people used to deal with the pandemic, along with their effectiveness.
Mr Polizzi said:
“It is also important to test the coping strategies we proposed in our article to see if people did use them to reduce distress during the pandemic, as well identify additional techniques individuals used to cope with stress to enhance recommendations for coping during future mass traumas.”
The study was published in the journal Clinical Neuropsychiatry (Polizzi et al., 2020).
The technique made people feel more relaxed, detached and in control.
Just 10 minutes petting a cat or dog reduces stress levels.
People were given a stress test involving putting their hand into cold water.
This can help to reduce cholesterol levels, research finds.
This can help to reduce cholesterol levels, research finds.
People who have a lower response to stress also have lower levels of cholesterol, which is linked to better health, research finds.
High cholesterol can lead to heart disease and other health problems.
The study included 199 middle-aged men and women who were given a stress test and followed for three years.
The results showed that those who responded best to stress had a much lower risk of having clinically high cholesterol.
Professor Andrew Steptoe, the study’s first author, explained the variability in people’s stress response:
“Some of the participants show large increases even in the short term, while others show very little response.
The cholesterol responses that we measured in the lab probably reflect the way people react to challenges in everyday life as well.
So the larger cholesterol responders to stress tasks will be large responders to emotional situations in their lives.
It is these responses in everyday life that accumulate to lead to an increase in fasting cholesterol or lipid levels three years later.
It appears that a person’s reaction to stress is one mechanism through which higher lipid levels may develop.”
The link between stress and cholesterol is not fully understood.
However, it may be that stress encourages the body to produce more energy; in response the liver has to secrete more LDL, which carries cholesterol.
Stress may also inhibit the body’s ability to clear lipids or encourage the inflammatory processes.
Professor Steptoe continued:
“The levels are something to be concerned about.
It does give us an opportunity to know whose cholesterol may rise in response to stress and give us warning for those who may be more at risk for coronary heart disease.”
The study was published in the journal Health Psychology (Steptoe & Brydon, 2005).
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