Psychology Assignment: Theories of Stress, Emotion, and Helplessness

This psychology assignment delves into the complexities of stress, emotion, and learned helplessness. It begins by defining stress according to Lazarus, emphasizing the role of cognitive appraisal in shaping emotional responses. The assignment then explores cognitive mediational theory, highlighting the interplay between stimulus, appraisal, and emotional responses, including the impact of previous experiences on emotional arousal. Finally, the assignment examines the concept of learned helplessness, detailing its origins in Seligman's experiments and its implications for understanding interpersonal events and providing effective care and counseling. The assignment references key psychological theories and research, offering a comprehensive overview of these interconnected psychological concepts.

Running head: PSYCHOLOGY ASSIGNMENT
PSYCHOLOGY ASSIGNMENT
Name of the Student
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Author note

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Answer 1
As per Lazarus, stress is a state of mind which is reached when the person suffering from
it starts believing that his or associated demands has exceeded the level of personal and social
resources which he was able to mobilize (Lazarus, 2013). Further he also adds to the factors that
neither the environment nor the person define the level of stress but the person and his perception
about stress determines the level of stress. In this theory, stress is shown as a state of mind which
is changed by the human mind and its determination (Moors et al., 2013). If the person does not
want to be affected with the effects of stress, then the stress will not affect the person, as the
person will overcome his or her vulnerability.
On the other hand cognitive appraisal theory is the evaluation process within psychology
in which the emotions of people are extracted from this assessment procedure so that different
people and their specific reactions could be identified (Nahum-Shani, Hekler & Spruijt-Metz,
2015). This is the way assessment of people and their way of reaction in any emotional situation
could be identified. Therefore, there are several emotion focused strategies which could be used
to reduce stress in people. The first are keeping the person affected with stress busy in his or her
work so that stress and emotions cannot affect the person extensively (Lazarus, 2013). The
second strategy will be travelling and implementing effective change in life so that people can
make new memories and could forget the stressful situations in life.
Answer 2
The cognitive mediational theory determines that the human emotions are determined by
the arousal of the stimulus and then appraisal of the stimulus which occurs between the stimulus
and the emotional responses (Reivich et al., 2013). This model of health included three primary

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aspects such as stress, health and lifestyle. Therefore, it is shown that previously witnessed or
experienced fear and anxiety is able to create emotional arousal in the patients who are unable to
react to sew stressors of the environment (Moors et al., 2013). Further, it has also be seen that
due to issues occurred in the emotional arousal people starts reacting angrily and euphoric and
angry behavior is observed.
Answer 3
Helplessness is the state of mind using which several theories and fundamental concepts
have been prepared and hence, it is an important concept which is used to determine the
interpersonal events which is responsible for the effective care and counselling of the person
(Reivich et al., 2013). Learned helplessness is the phenomenon which occurs when people feel
helplessness to avoid several negative situations. This was first observed by the physiologist
Martin Seligman while he was conducting his tests on a dog (Maier & Seligman, 2013). This was
observed that the dog did not escape the place instead of suffering from multiple shocks as it
understood that the shocks will never stop and he had to live with it. Hence it involved
pessimism, depression, learned helplessness and cognitive distortions that affects the situation of
the sufferer while going through the helpless phase (Lazarus, 2013).

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References
Lazarus, R. S. (2013). Fifty years of the research and theory of RS Lazarus: An analysis of
historical and perennial issues. Psychology Press.
Maier, S. F., & Seligman, M. E. (2016). Learned helplessness at fifty: Insights from
neuroscience. Psychological review, 123(4), 349.
Moors, A., Ellsworth, P. C., Scherer, K. R., & Frijda, N. H. (2013). Appraisal theories of
emotion: State of the art and future development. Emotion Review, 5(2), 119-124.
Nahum-Shani, I., Hekler, E. B., & Spruijt-Metz, D. (2015). Building health behavior models to
guide the development of just-in-time adaptive interventions: A pragmatic
framework. Health Psychology, 34(S), 1209.
Reivich, K., Gillham, J. E., Chaplin, T. M., & Seligman, M. E. (2013). From helplessness to
optimism: The role of resilience in treating and preventing depression in youth.
In Handbook of resilience in children (pp. 201-214). Springer, Boston, MA.