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Stress can affect people, especially if they perceive threats in their surroundings. During a threat perception, signals are automatically transmitted to the mind, which creates a response to the risk. However, the reoccurrence of stressful incidents can lead to health effects, and without proper help, it evolves into a chronic condition that takes a toll on the individual's health. Experts define stress as a normal reaction to the inability to handle particular demands or circumstances that lead to emotional, physical, and psychological tension. Often individuals find themselves in compromising situations that make them feel stressed. The paper argues that stress can result from an amalgam of social and environmental factors and lead to health issues if not mitigated in time.
Individual exposure to social stressors for an extended period can lead to stress. Research by Senanayake et al. identified social factors of stress as social roles or status, generation gap, disability, and unsafe environment. Social roles or status contributed to stress as the immediate society, which comprises the neighbors, extended family, and the work community, defined individuals according to their occupations. Those from a low social status could not fit into the roles meant for individuals from high social status hence enduring high social stressors. Senanayake et al. also identified generation gap as a social stress determinant. They discovered that the age difference between parents and children could spread arguments to the extended family. Stress levels increased during acute periods of discord due to ongoing debates and disagreements.
Disability causes discrimination in society due to the limited capabilities that individuals have. Social discrimination due to disability is a stressor, as asserted by Senanayake et al. In addition to discrimination, disability attached to diseases is linked to stigmatization which causes low self-esteem to the disabled as they tend to feel alienated in new environments. Besides individuals with disabilities suffering from stress, those who take care of the disabled are often stressed by the responsibility. Gupta et al. elucidated that extra demands as a result of chronic conditions of disability result to stress on parents. The stress was due to insufficient resources and social support in raising children with disability.
Living environments matter in terms of stress when it comes to security issues. People from secure living environments find it stressful when they relocate or visit insecure neighborhoods accumulating stress levels. Research findings from a study by Wei et al. on a population in China show that residents living in communities with environmental insecurities exhibited psychological distress. In addition, a conflict environment negatively impacts individuals' well-being, as the events expose people to stressors.
The physical surroundings significantly impact how people feel, think and behave. Stress happens when those expectations surpass a person's capacity to meet environmental demands. However, environmental stimuli affect people differently, and the results may differ during exposure to the stressors (Gatersleben and Griffin). Apart from the social factors contributing to stress, environmental factors can act as determinants of individual stress, like extreme weather conditions, noise, natural disasters, crowding, poor housing, traffic congestion, and pollution.
Environmental stressors can strain both the body and mind leading to distress. Bell et al. note that extreme weather changes can cause stress on individuals due to their massive damage. For instance, it is stressful for individuals to lose their homes or valuable property in floods. According to Bilotta et al., protracted noise causes physiological stress to those in the surrounding environment. When a person feels that there are more people present than they would desire, they are said to be crowded, and the situation causes discomfort hence psychological strain. Heavy traffic congestion may result from high physiological stress and adverse effects.
Both the social and environmental factors of stress have health impacts on individuals. In humans, chronic stress is a significant risk factor for mental health issues. The underlying illnesses include anxiety, depression, gastrointestinal disorders, weakened immunity, and sexual dysfunctions (Nguyen et al. 8). Stress exposure is a unique risk factor for mental illnesses like posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety, and depression (Javidi and Yodalle). Social stress also causes vagal withdrawal, raised blood pressure, plasma catecholamine levels, hyperthermia, and enhanced hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activation (Wood and Bhatnagar 165). Headaches and stomach discomfort are two physical symptoms of environmental stress, chest pain, high blood pressure, and difficulty sleeping.
In conclusion, social and environmental factors expose people to stressors differently, which can cause health problems in the long run. The social stressors include but are not limited to social roles or status, generation gap, disability, and unsafe environment. On the other hand, environmental stressors range from extreme weather conditions, noise, natural disasters, crowding, poor housing, and traffic congestion to pollution. When the body is used to stress, it reaches a point where it is incapable of responding to it, causing health problems. Some health issues associated with social and environmental factors include anxiety, depression, gastrointestinal disorders, weakened immunity, sexual dysfunctions, PTSD, vagal withdrawal, raised blood pressure, plasma catecholamine levels, hyperthermia, and enhanced hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activation. Also, it can lead to problems like headaches and stomach discomfort, chest pain, high blood pressure, and difficulty sleeping. Early intervention to stress can prevent the health impacts as some cause irreparable damage to the patients.
Works Cited
Bell, Jesse E., et al. "Changes in extreme events and the potential impacts on human health." Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association 68.4 (2018): 265–287.
Bilotta, Elena, Uchita Vaid, and Gary W. Evans. "Environmental stress." Environmental psychology: an introduction (2018): 36-44.
Gatersleben, Birgitta, and Isabelle Griffin. "Environmental stress." Handbook of environmental psychology and quality of life research. Springer, Cham, 2017. 469-485.
Gupta, Vidya Bhushan, Priyanka Mehrotra, and Naveen Mehrotra. "Parental stress in raising a child with disabilities in India." Disability, CBR & Inclusive Development 23.2 (2012): 41–52.
Javidi, Hojjatollah, and M. Yadollahie. "Posttraumatic stress disorder." (2012): 2-9.
Nguyen, U. S. D. T., L. Quach, and T. V. Tran. "Social stress." Encyclopedia of gerontology and population aging, Springer, Cham (2020).
Senanayake, Buddhika, et al. "Stress and its Social Determinants-A Qualitative Study Reflecting the Perceptions of a Select Small Group of the Public in Sri Lanka." Indian journal of psychological medicine 42.1 (2020): 69–79.
Wei, Qingong, Qiaoqiong Shang, and Qingping Bu. "Consequences of living environment insecurity on health and well‐being in southwest China: The role of community cohesion and social support." Health & Social Care in the Community (2022).
Wood, Susan K., and Seema Bhatnagar. "Resilience to the effects of social stress: Evidence from clinical and preclinical studies on the role of coping strategies." Neurobiology of stress 1 (2015): 164-173.
