What is Stress?
According to the Organizational Behavior textbook, it is an individual’s “adaptive response to a situation that is perceived as challenging or threatening to the person’s wellbeing” (p.198). Stress is a feeling that is created when we react to particular events, the body's way of rising to a challenge and preparing to meet a tough situation with focus, strength, stamina, and heightened alertness. The events that provoke stress are called stressors, and they cover a whole range of situations, everything from outright physical danger to making a class presentation or taking a semester's worth of your toughest subject.
The Stress Response
The human body responds to stressors by activating the nervous system and specific hormones that speed up heart rate, breathing rate, blood pressure, and metabolism. Blood vessels open wider to let more blood flow to large muscle groups, putting our muscles on alert. Pupils dilate to improve vision. The liver releases some......
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