Psychological methods of stress management Stress Inoculation Training

1. Psychological methods of stress managementStress Inoculation Training

2. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy • Meichenbaum (1985) said we can’t usually change the causes of stress in our life. But, we can change what we think about them. • Negative thinking may lead to negative outcomes i.e. anxiety and depression. Whereas, positive thinking may lead to more positive attitudes and feelings. These reduce our stress response. • Meichenbaum’s therapy is called stress inoculation training – a form of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. • He suggested that an individual should develop a form of coping before the problem arises(inoculation). Like, how we would receive injections to protect us against diseases i.e. measles.

3. Conceptualisation Phase • There are three phases to Stress Inoculation Training: • Conceptualisation phase – The therapist and client establish a relationship and the client is taught about the nature and impact of stress. For example, the client may be taught to view threats as problems to be solved. This enables the client to think differently about their problem. (reconceptualise) Self-defeating attitudes and coping mechanisms are identified through a ‘Socratic’ typeexchange. This is when the therapist asks curious questions in order to help the client understand their cognitions and behaviour. • Meichenbaum considers this relationship to be important as if it’s the ‘glue’ that allows the various aspects of the therapy to work.

4. Skills acquisition 2. Skills acquisitions phase(and rehearsal) – These coping skills the client was taught are practised first in the clinic and then gradually rehearsed in real life. These skills are taught and suited to the individual’s own specific problems. These skills include: Positive thinking: “The glass is always half full, not half empty” - Josh Relaxation: meditation, deep breathing ,relaxing music, guided imagery, progressive muscle relaxation Social skills: cooperation, being patient, respectful, following directions, accepting differences Methods of attention diversion Using social support systems: friends, family, etc. Time-management: the way people manage their time in order for their workload not to seem so stressful

5. Application phase • In this final stage, the clients are given several opportunities to apply the newly learned coping skills in different situations. Various techniques are used such as: • Imagery- imagining how one would deal with these situations • Modelling – watching else deal with stressors and then imitating this behaviour • Role-playing - acting out scenes involving stressors • Clients may sometimes be asked to help train others • Booster sessions(follow-through) are offered later on.

6. Strengths of SIT • Meichenbaum (1977) compared SIT with another treatment called systematic desensitisation. Even though both forms of therapy helped, SIT was better, because it helped to deal with a second, non-treated phobia. It shows that SIT inoculated against future stressful situations and offers help in coping with current problems. • Sheehy and Horan(2004) investigated the effects of SIT on the anxiety, stress and academic performance of first-year law students. The participants attended four weekly session of SIT(90 minutes each).

7. The results showed that all participants who received showed lower levels of anxiety and stress overtime. Also, the students that were expected to finish in the bottom 20% of their class also showed significant improvement after SIT and more than 50% of the students improved their predicted class rank. • Another advantage to SIT is that it doesn’t only deal with current stressors, but also helps to deal with future problems by providing the right skills and confidence. This provides a long lasting effectiveness so that the individual is less affected by stressful situations in the future

8. Weaknesses of SIT • SIT requires a lot of time, effort, motivation and money. You can say that its strengths are also its weaknesses because it’s effective because it involves leaning and practising a lot of new skills. This would only suit a limited range of determined individuals as it is a complex and long therapy. • It can be said that the effectiveness of SIT is attributed to certain elements of the training rather than all of it. This means that all these activities included in the training can be reduced without losing its effectiveness.