StressProne and StressResistant Personalities Chapter 6

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Stress-Prone and Stress-Resistant
PersonalitiesChapter 6
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• When I was 25, I got testicular cancer and
  nearly died. I dont know why I am still alive. I
  can only guess. I have a tough constitution and
  my profession taught me how to compete against
  long odds and big obstacles.
  
• Lance Armstrong

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Personality

• Personality is thought to comprise several
• traits, characteristics, behaviors, expressions,
  moods
• feelings as perceived by others
• The complexity of ones personality is thought to
  be shaped by
• genetic factors
• personal experiences
• family dynamics and other social influences

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Stress-Prone Personalities

• These personalities do not cope with stress well
• Type A personality
• Codependent personality
• Helpless-hopeless personality

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Type A Behavior

• Once associated with time urgency is now
  associated with unresolved anger.
• Greater predictor of CHD than all other risk
  factors combined
• Prone to sympathetic arousal (increased BP, CHOL,
  TG)
• Traits
• Urgency, multitasking, ultra-competitiveness,
  rapid speech patterns, manipulative control,
  hyperaggressiveness free-floating hostility

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Type A v. Type D

• Agression v. depression
• Tendency to depression Negative affect
• Worry, irritability, gloom, social inhibition
• Ornish suggests love is not commonly expressed in
  Type A or D

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Codependent Personality

• Increase perceptions of stress decrease ability
  to cope
• Addictive in nature validated by making others
  dependant
• Enablers
• Survival skills
• Process addiction
• Traits
• Behaviors

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Helpless-Hopeless Personality

• Low self-esteem
• Given up due to repeated failure
• External locus of control
• Poor self-motivation
• Emotional dysfunction resulting in chronic
  depression
• External locus of control of reinforcing behavior

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Stress-Resistant Personalities

• These personalities cope with stress well
• Hardy Personality
• Survivor Personality
• 3. Type R Personality (Sensation Seekers)

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The Hardy Personality

• Commitment (invests oneself in the solution)
• Control (takes control of a situation, doesnt
  run from it)
• Challenge (sees opportunity rather than the
  problems)

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Survivor Personality Traits

• A person who responds rather than reacts to
  danger/stress
• Bi-phase traits (left and right brain skills)
• Proud but humble
• Selfish but altruistic
• Rebellious but cooperative
• Spiritual but irreverent
• Considered optimists and good at creative problem
  solving

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Characteristics of High Self-Esteem

• Connectedness (support groups)
• Uniqueness (special qualities)
• Empowerment (uses inner resources)
• Role models or mentors (has others to look up to)
• Calculated risk taking Type R (not motivated by
  fear)