Transcript Choices in Relationships

Choices in
Relationships
Chapter Thirteen: Stress and Crisis in Relationships
Personal Stress and Crisis Events
• Definitions of Stress and Crisis Events
– Stress is a reaction of the body to substantial
or unusual demands (physical, environmental,
or interpersonal) made on it.
– A crisis is a crucial situation that requires
changes in normal patterns of behavior.
Personal Stress and Crisis Events
• Resilient Families
– Resiliency refers to a family’s strengths and ability to
respond to a crisis in a positive way.
– Several characteristics associated with resilient
families include:
• Having a joint cause or purpose
• Emotional support for each other
• Good problem-solving skills
• The ability to delay gratification
Personal Stress and Crisis Events
– Several characteristics associated with
resilient families include
• Flexibility
• Accessing residual resources
• Communication
• Commitment
Personal Stress and Crisis Events
• A Family Stress Model
– How a family experiences and responds to
stress depends not only on the event but also
on the family’s coping resources and
perceptions of the event.
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Changing Basic Values and Perspective
– The strategy that many people cite as being
helpful is changing basic values as a result of
the crisis situation.
• Exercise
– Exercise has also been associated with
successful crisis coping and better health.
– Exercise is also an effective stress reducer.
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Biofeedback
– Biofeedback treatment teaches a person to
influence biological responses such as heart
rate, nervous system arousal, muscle
contractions, and even brain wave
functioning.
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Electromyographic (EMG) biofeedback,
Thermal or temperature biofeedback
Galvanic skin response (GSR) biofeedback
Neurofeedback
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Sleep
– Getting an adequate amount of sleep is also
associated with low stress levels.
• Love
– A love relationship also helps an individual
cope with stress.
– Similarly, intimacy in one’s marriage, as well
as being able to talk with family members, is
associated with stress reduction.
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Religion and Spirituality
– Spirituality, defined as having purpose and
meaning in life, having inner resources,
feeling connected to others, and being able to
transcend one’s physical or psychological
condition may also be positively related to
reducing stress and coping with crisis events.
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Friends and Relatives
– By reaching out to friends and relatives, people do not
feel so alone and vulnerable in the world and perhaps
this enables them to prepare themselves for the worst
• Multiple Roles
– Another factor that helps individuals cope with stress
is to be involved in multiple roles.
– The greater the number of roles, the lower the
depression and the higher the psychological wellbeing.
Positive Stress
Management Strategies
• Humor
– Humor is associated with a number of
positive outcomes, including stress reduction,
physical health, mental well-being, and life
satisfaction.
• Other Helpful Strategies
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Intervening early in a crisis.
Avoiding blame.
Keep destructive impulses in check.
Seek opportunities for fun.
Harmful Strategies
• Harmful Stress Management Strategies
– Some coping strategies not only are
ineffective for resolving family problems but
also add to the family’s stress by making the
problem worse.
– These included keeping feelings inside, taking
out frustrations on others, and denying or
avoiding the problem.
Five Family Crises
• Physical Illness and Disability
– “Major illness/injury to self” was ranked the
number 3 most stressful life event (from a list
of 51) by over 3,000 adult respondents (death
of spouse and death of close family member
were numbers 1 and 2).
– Although short-term illness and disability
often produce stress in the family, long-term
illness and disability have profound and
enduring effects on family members and
family life.
Five Family Crises
• Physical Illness and Disability
– Intimacy and Threatened Loss
– Establishing Healthy Boundaries
– Togetherness and Separateness
Five Family Crises
• Extramarital Affair
– Extramarital affair refers to the emotional and
sexual involvement of a spouse with someone
other than the mate.
Five Family Crises
• Extramarital Affair
– Extradyadic involvement refers to all pairbonded individuals who are emotionally and
sexually involved with someone other than
the partner.
• Gender Differences in Views of an
Extramarital Affair
Five Family Crises
• Reasons for Extramarital Involvements
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Variety, novelty, and excitement
Workplace friendships
Relationship dissatisfaction
Revenge
Homosexual relationship
Aging
Absence from partner
Should You Seek a Divorce If
Your Partner Has an Affair?
• One alternative is to end the relationship
immediately on the premise that trust has
been broken and can never be mended.
• Other couples respond to a partner’s
emotional and sexual involvement with
acceptance.
• When spouses do stay together after an
affair, the price is high.
Five Family Crises
• Unemployment
– The effects of unemployment may be more
severe for men than for women.
• Drug Abuse
– Spouses, parents, and children who abuse
drugs contribute to the stress and conflict
experienced in their respective marriages and
families.
Five Family Crises
• Teenage Drug Abuse
• Drug Abuse Support Groups
– Al-Anon
Five Family Crises
• Death
– Death of One’s Child
• Intimacy and sexual needs
• Views and feelings about having other children
• Methods of childrearing to be used for the
surviving child or children
– Death of One’s Parent
– Surviving the Suicide of a Loved One
Marriage and Family Therapy
• Availability of Marriage and Family
Therapists
– There are around 50,000 marriage and family
therapists in the United States.
• Brief Solution-Based Therapy
– The “cognitive-behavioral” approach focuses
on the cognitions or assumptions that underlie
a marriage or family with the goal of ensuring
that these are accurate and functional.
Marriage and Family Therapy
• Though these may be helpful for getting e-mail answers
to e-mail questions, ongoing on-line marital therapy is
virtually unknown.
• Since effective marriage counseling requires the
participation and involvement of both spouses, on-line
marital therapy is made difficult since both partners
would need to be on-line at the same time.
• In addition, nonverbal interaction behaviors cannot be
observed by the therapist.