ABSTRACT

People express, experience, and manage the stresses of everyday life in many ways. Stress can be defined as the response of humans to environmental demands, also referred to as a biological ‘fight or flight response.’ Some stress is good: it increases alertness and performance, enabling people to adapt to the needs of a given situation. But when people are subjected to a continuing assault of stressors, they can become exhausted and sick. Social epidemiologists assert that stress is exacerbated when people experience ongoing unpredictable circumstance and a lack of control (Brunner and Marmot 1999).