Social Relationships, Stress and Mental Health Essay

Stress, Social Support, And Social Relationships

Social relationships are basically regarded to have positive and negative effects on the capability of human bodies to resist infection. However, these relationships and support sometimes contribute to social conflicts, which are in turn the common causes of stressful environments. The social conflicts emerging from social relationships and social support contribute to stressful life events including chronic problems at home and the workplace as well as stressful incidents that involve family, work colleagues, school mates, and friends. As a result, these three issues have been the subject of various studies and researches that seek to illuminate the significance of social relationships and support in dealing with stress. This article presents a summary and analysis of three articles conducted on this issue in light of emotions, social relationships, and health.

Summary of Article One

Bowen et al. conducted a study on the stress-buffering impacts of purposeful social support on ambulatory blood pressure (p.1440). This research was carried out on the premise that social support is a valid indicator of cardiovascular health. The study by these researchers was also based on the hypothesis that social support may be associated with health since it decreases stress evaluations or deteriorates the link between stress and negative health results and outcomes. In their study, the researchers recognize that previous analyses examine stress-buffering through internal belief that support is available in a person's network when needed rather than actual enacted support based on the structure of an individual's network. They state that analyzing particular support functions provides necessary information about mechanisms beneath the link between global support and health. Consequently, the researchers focused on evaluating certain links to personal support functions, especially emotional and informational support that are regarded as the most consistent stress-buffering functions.

The study was conducted on a group of participants comprising 94 healthy heterosexual couples from the community. The research methodology involved the use of Interpersonal Support Evaluation List (ISEL), Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), Ambulatory Blood Pressure (ABP), and Ambulatory Diary Record (ADR). The results in each of these measures were analyzed through PROC MIXED model and preliminary analyses. The researchers found that informational support constantly buffered the association between temporary stress and both ambulatory systolic and diastolic blood pressure (Bowen et al., p.1443). In essence, global support as well as emotional, tangible and informational support only restrained the impacts of temporary stress but not global stress. The researchers conclude by suggesting that perceived availability of social networks of support that can offer beneficial information or advice is a specific relevant support resource with regards to stress as opposed to global support exclusively. In the face of temporary stress, information support buffering impacts may safeguard against cardiovascular morbidity over time through lessening ambulatory blood pressure.

Summary of Article Two

Christian J. Merz, Oliver T. Wolf and Jurgen Hennig conducted a research on the issue of how stress damages retrieval of socially relevant information. The research was based on the fact that various studies have indicated that stress damages retrieval of memory though their findings are not unequivocal (Merz, Wolf & Hennig, p.288). The research was also influenced by the fact that previous studies have not examined memory for social relevant information. Consequently, their research focused on assessing the effects of stress on the retrieval of information or memory that is socially relevant.

In their study, these researchers utilized a randomized balanced cross-over experiment over a group of 29 participants, which comprised 15 women. The experiment involved conducting two tests on the cognitive performance of these participants as well as testing their social memory in a stress session. In this case, the participants were subjected to a short standardized psychosocial laboratory stressor whose performance was compared to cognitive performance in a stress-free control session. These researchers found that the retrieval of social memory was significantly lessened after stress due to cortisol response. Cortisol response was characterized by considerable changes in cortisol mood and secretion following the successful stress induction. Generally, exposure to stress generated an increase in cortisol concentrations and significant changes in various mood measures. In addition, the retrieval of declaratory memory for information that is socially relevant is damaged after exposure to acute stress just like other forms of declarative memory. The authors conclude by stating that their study demonstrates that acute stress significantly damages the retrieval of information that is socially relevant (Merz, Wolf & Hennig, p.292).

Summary of Article Three

The third article is a research that was carried out by Niall Bolger and John Eckenrode based on the common perception that social relationships buffer the impacts of stress on mental well-being. These researchers carried out a study on social relationships, personality, and anxiety in the midst of a major stressful life event. Despite the common perception, the researchers argue that these obvious buffering effects may be false reflections of personality or previous mental health (Bolger & Eckenrode, p.440). As a result, they investigated the likelihood of these perceptions being false indicators of previous mental health or personality.

The research entailed conducting investigations in a forthcoming study of a medical school entrance examination among a group of 226 premedical students. The researchers rated the personality and social relationships of these students 5 weeks before the exam. This was followed by rating their levels of anxiety in a 35-day period that surrounded the medical school entrance examination. The use of examinations in this study was influenced by various factors including the fact that they are geared toward a similar objective event for all participants and the fact that they do not intrinsically entail changes in social relationships (Bolger & Eckenrode, p.442). The evaluation of social relationships involved the adoption of two major approaches i.e. operationalizing relationships in structural terms i.e. frequency of social networks and operationalizing relationships in functional terms i.e. perceived quality of a person's relations.

The research generated two major findings including the observation that social integration protected against increases in anxiety understress whereas perceived social support did not (Bolger & Eckenrode, p.445). Secondly, the researchers established that not every form of social integration was profitable since more discretionary forms buffered stress whereas others like social integration at school and work did not. In addition, they found that social integration with next of kin worsened negative impacts of stress.

Analysis of the Articles

These three research articles provide significant insights on understanding emotions, social relationships and support, and mental health. The article by Bowen et al. confirmed previous findings that social support may buffer acute stress reactions as documented in laboratory surveys where participants were exposed to behavioral challenges (al'Absi, p.220). The effect of social relationships and support on acute stress reactions has been the subject of numerous studies that have tested several variations on the issue. The findings by Bowen et al. demonstrated that high social support has a stress buffering effect on mental function and health both in real life and laboratory studies. In this case, psychological or mental factors are not only important determinants of stress responses but also play a crucial role in cardiovascular health ambulatory support.

The research by Merz, Wolf and Hennig demonstrates that there is a strong link between psychological function and social relationships and support. The study demonstrates that this link is evident through the impact of stress on retrieval of socially relevant information. This implies that an individual's social relationships and social support are affected if his/her psychological function is impaired, especially through stress. In this case, the ability of the individual to retrieve information that is socially relevant is impacted if damaged if his/her psychological function is impaired, which in turn affects social relationships and integration. These findings demonstrate that psychological function has positive and negative influences on social relationships. Moreover, social relationships and support can impair psychological function through generating social conflicts, which cause stressful events (Cohen, p.221).

The third study provides important insights on emotion, social relationships, and mental health by challenging existing assumptions that social support studies have depended heavily on perceived-support aspects of relationships. The study provides insights on the casual dynamics of the process of stress and the link between stress and health based on life events. Even though it does not focus on examining the association between stress and health, the research shows that life events can generate stress, which may not be dealt with through social relationships and social integration.

In conclusion, these studies demonstrate that social relationships and support, emotions, and mental health are strongly linked. This basically implies that stress can emerge from normal life events and result in mental health issues, especially when social relationships and social integration do not deal with these situations effectively. Generally, while social relationships and support have positive effects on family and social life though they sometimes generate social conflicts, which affect mental health by impairing psychological function.

Works Cited

Absi, Mustafa Al. Stress and Addiction: Biological and Psychological Mechanisms. Amsterdam: Academic, 2007. Print.

Bolger, Niall, and John Eckenrode. "Social Relationships, Personality, and Anxiety during a Major…