The History of Stress Research

My boss once told me that "a little bit of stress never hurt anyone"... WRONG!! The truth is that high stress levels increases your chances of getting all kinds of physical illnesses and mental illnesses. However, this knowledge of how dangerous stress can be... is actually decently new to the medical field. How would I have defended myself to my boss before we had the facts?

The History of Stress

Technically, stress has been around since the dawn of time... however, as far as text books are concerned our concept and understanding of stress has only been around for about 75 years. How exactly? What we refer to as "stress" today was defined by Dr. Hans Selye AKA the 'Father' of stress research. Why is he so important to the field of stress research? Because he discovered and described the 'General Adaptation Syndrome.'

Dr. Selye observed patients that appeared to be suffering from different diseases, yet they often exhibited identical signs and symptoms. These symptoms included, but not limited to, "lack of appetite", "low energy", "the need to lie down", sometimes followed by the inability to get back up. Simply put, patients felt what they described as generally felling 'unwell.' These 'symptoms' are common for any disease. However, some diseases have stress to be a decisive factor. As a medical student, Dr. Selye made the first few observations that may have been the first step in his recognition of “stress.”

However, don't get confused by these extreme examples. Some kinds of stress, in smaller amounts, can be good for you. When asked in an interview if his research was giving him stress, Dr. Selye simply said ,"You have to be under stress to make life worthwhile."

Stress is on the Rise!

Having all this knowledge and understanding about stress didn't help get rid of it... in fact, things seems to worse now! Today, results show increases in stress in almost every demographic category from 1983 to 2009, ranging from 10 to 30 percent.

"A scientific analysis of stress over time offers some proof that there's more stress in people's lives today than 25 years ago"—Sharon Jayson

Hello. Nice to meet you! How are you? Hmm... this feels like a really one-sided conversation... why don't you follow me on social media so I can get to know you too!

About the Author

I started blogging about two years ago and my collection of blogs and articles is getting pretty impressive. I’ve taken online classes for writing and even some classes about the art of blogging itself. It would be really awesome if you join the adventure and maybe even help me think of what to write about next. If you would like to submit some feedback or ideas, you can always tweet me on Twitter.

Like the story? Share it on social media!

Thank you for reading my article. Would it be okay if I ask another favour though? Would it be okay if you share this on your Facebook page or Twitter? If you can't share, there is a tiny little donate box at the bottom too. No pressure though, just thought I would mention it.

Work Cited

Jayson, Sharon. “Stress Levels Increased since 1983, New Analysis Shows.” USA Today, Gannett Satellite Information Network, 13 June 2012, usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/health/story/2012-06-13/stress-increase-over-time/55587296/1.

Jr, William C. Shiel. “Definition of Stress.” MedicineNet, www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=20104.