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Mirelda Calderon
1102-096
T. Sotirakopulos
4 May 2016

Stress: its not Always Negative

Stress is many things, its a highly unpleasant emotion that makes you feel
like everything has become just very overwhelming and that the world is stacking
up against us according to Susan Knowlton. Stress has also been known to lower the
immune system making us more likely to become ill as well as affect the way we
make decisions causing our abilities that we make poor judgment calls happen more
often. We tend to feel stress when we have multiple tasks to complete, when we
have three finals on the same day, when we feel like we wont meet a deadline
leaving us unable to concentrate and causing people to choke (Knowlton 1).
However, every emotion exists for a reason and what many do not realize is the
advantages of stress. Even though some may assume that stress has a negative
outcome to our body and health something you should also know is that stress is a
great motivator, its a cognitive enhancer, and its physically enhancing as well.
Like I said earlier You always think stress as a really bad thing, but its not,
said Daniela Kaufer, a biology professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
Some amounts of stress are good to push you just to the level of optimal alertness,
behavioral and cognitive performance (Sanders 1). As a cognitive enhancer it can
boost several aspects of your ability to accomplish success and help us
professionally and academically as well. While stress helps our brain to focus it also
helps us react to dangerous situations. An example might be trying to escape from

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a predator. Its a way to narrow your attention and to focus on the task in hand
(Knowlton 1). I believe that the fact that stress can make us become more alert of
our surroundings is impressive and can even save our lives if youre stuck in a
difficult situation. There have also been some studies where stress helps increase
memory and recall and its a result of slightly higher levels of cortisone. Cortisol is a
stress hormone. But moderation is very important because cortisone levels that are
too high have been also shown to cause damage to the hippocampus. The
hippocampus is located in the medial temporal lobe of the brain. It plays important
roles in the consolidation of information from short term memory to long term
memory and spatial navigation which records information about ones environment.
Furthermore, stress equals problems. Sure we can say that because
neuroscientists at the University of California, Berkeley, have found that chronic
stress can trigger long term changes in the brains structure and function (Bergland
1). Chronic stress is said to cause mental problems like anxiety, learning problems,
and mood disorders later in life. Which to me yes this makes me think that stress is
horrible and can really affect your life. Cortisol which is a stress hormone can
weaken the immune system and cause depression, fatigue, and even heart diseases
as well (Good Stress). But we have control over our bodys and what is important
here is that our bodies send us signs when we are in too much stress like headache,
changes in appetite, not being able to concentrate or complete tasks, and even
trouble sleeping (Good Stress).
Then again stress is positive because its motivating. Heres an example that
all students live every day when at school there comes a time where you have to
study many chapters for an exam, a midterm, and or final. Some people would have
begun very early to have a good head start and be prepared for any exam. Other

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people however would have waited until the last night to cram as quickly as
possible to learn it all in one night or they may have decided to skip this step and
just hope they will remember everything lectured in class (Knowlton 1). So, we all
know the one who studied harder and the longest performed better during the
exams and they were the ones who were more effected by stress. On the other
hand, there could also be students who experience too much stress that causes
them to be prone to panic attacks. So the trick becomes to be able to control and
monitor the amount of stress you feel to only be positive amounts that will benefit
you rather than make you suffer for it (Knowlton 1). Psychologist Hans Seley is
often called the Father of Stress due to his extensive research into the topic. He
called these smaller amounts of positive stress eustress (Knowlton 1).
At the same time stress is physically enhancing, it improves your brain
function so that it may also increase your physical performance and endurance. This
causes the release of adrenaline which then speeds up your heart rate as well as
your metabolism. For an athlete a bit of stress is a great thing because it could help
them with any deadline they have to meet and most importantly because its
physically enhancing. Adrenaline can also help fight tiredness and fatigue (Knowlton
1). While too little stress can lead to boredom and depressions, too much can cause
anxiety and poor health. The right amount of stress will tune up the brain and
improves all types of performance and health (Sanders 1). So theres a lot of back
and forth of how stress is negative to your body as well as how stress is the key to
survival.
Rats! Yes, rats, there was studies on them at UC Berkeleys Helen Wills
Neuroscience Institute by Kaufer, Kirby and their colleagues. Heres where they
found that stressful events caused stem cells in their brains to proliferate into new

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nerve cells that when mature, two weeks later it improves the rats mental
performance. Kaufer was initially interested in how both acute and chronic stress
affect memory, and since the brains hippocampus is critical to memory, they
focused on the effects of stress on neural stem cells in the hippocampus of the adult
rat brain. The dentate gyrus of the hippocampus is one of only two areas in the
brain that generate new brain cells in adults, and is highly sensitive to
glucocorticoid stress hormones. So what he discovered was that the stressed rats
performed better on a memory test two weeks after the stressful event while using
special cell labeling techniques (Sanders 1).
With all this in mind, I conducted a small survey where I received 19
responses from students under the age group of 24 and the first thing that came to
their mind when they think of stress was school and work, no time, feeling
pressured, anxiety, feeling fatigue and depression. I was not surprised when I got
the results of how many people believe stress has a positive or negative outcome.
74% said stress has a negative outcome while only 26% believe stress has a
positive outcome (Calderon). This goes along with when you experience the fight or
flight stress response in your daily life it can raise blood pressure, suppress the
immune system, increase the risk of a heart attack and stroke. Some more
symptoms of a stress overload include memory problems, poor judgment, having a
negative mindset, feeling overwhelmed, and depression or general unhappiness
(Segal 1).
As well as when I asked in my survey if they believe stress may help them
meet daily challenges and motivates them to reach their goal, ironically my results
came in the opposite compared to the results of how many people believe stress
has a positive or negative outcome. I purposely changed the wording of my

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questions but basically theyre very similar because it has to do with the outcome of

Do believe stress may help you meet your daily challenges and motivates you to reach your goal?

Yes 58% No 42%

stress.

Heres a chart where

I got my results showing that they do believe stress has a positive outcome because
if it did not have a positive outcome their daily challenges would not be met and
they would also not be motivated by stress to reach their goal. 58% said yes they
believe stress may help them meet their challenges and motivates them to reach
their goal while only 42% said no stress doesnt help, which is less than half. I
personally think that I always thought stress was one of the worst feeling because it
has the capability to turn your day upside down. But I strongly now believe that

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turning your mindset on a more positive note will increase the outcomes of any type
of stress to your advantage.
Most important thing to realize is that we all handle stress differently and well
because we are all different. Some people are able to just go with the flow to
whatever life hits them with, while others tend to crumble when they have to face
smaller obstacles and frustrations. While some just love the feeling of stress
because they know how well they perform during that period of time. So its to
everyone experience, judgment, and liking if stress is far more positive than
negative. But even good things like money are a problem to many people in this
world. Just to show that no body nor anything like stress is supposed to be just one
way but the way we look at them is far more important because thats what impacts
our lives every day.
Some helpful ways to cope when stressed may be to have a support network
and to be socially engaged, its the bodies most evolved strategy for responding to
stress. Exercising is not only beneficial to your bodies exterior but also to your
mental health. Even going on a run for 30 minutes or a quick workout or yoga
session at home will dramatically change your negative thoughts about anything
stressing you out. Lastly, your sense of control and your ability to deal with your
emotions is such a life changing skill that will benefit you through your entire life
(Segal 1).
No matter how many surveys are conducted or opinions might be mentioned
during a conversation about stress at the end of the day theres nothing that can
disprove that stress keeps us alert and we perform better when we are alert. Also
that stress is a great motivator in the workplace, at school, or even at home getting

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things done, it is a cognitive enhancer because it makes you think and plan ahead
to better prepare yourself, and its physically enhancing as well increasing the
amount of adrenaline and endurance that goes through your body at that moment.
So just think about it a little because there is no life without stress.
Works Cited
Bergland, Christopher. "Chronic Stress Can Damage Brain Structure and
Connectivity." Psychology
Today. HealthProfs.com, 12 Feb. 2014. Web. 17 May 2016.

Calderon, Mirelda. Stress on Human Body (Positive). Survey. SurveyMonkey. 02

May. 2016. Web. 17
May. 2016

"Good Stress, Bad Stress - ULifeline." Good Stress, Bad Stress - ULifeline. The Jed
Foundation, 2016.
Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Knowlton, Susan. "The Positive Effects of Stress." The Positive Effects of Stress.
Health Guidance
for Better Health, 2016. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Sanders, Robert. "Researchers Find out Why Some Stress Is Good for You." Berkeley
News. Berkeley
University of California, 16 Apr. 2016. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Segal, Jeanne, and Melinda Smith. "Stress Symptoms, Signs, and Causes." Stress
Symptoms, Signs, &
Causes. HelpGuide, Apr. 2016. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.