UNIT 2:

ASPECTS OF PERSONAL
DEVELOPMENT
 LESSON 5: Coping with Stress in
Middle and Late Adolescence
• What is Stress?
– Subjective experience of distress in response to
perceived environmental problems.
Source of Stress and its Effects
• Specific Adolescent Challenges (by Zarret
and Eccles
– Managing new roles and responsibilities
– Identifying personal strengths and
weaknesses and refining skills to
coordinate and succeed in these roles
– Finding meaning and purpose in the
roles acquired
– Assessing and making necessary life
changes and coping with these changes
What Stresses Senior HS Students?
• Home and School – 2 most important
Domains where stress source are
centered
 Source of Stressors for Adolescents:
• Breakup with a boyfriend or girlfriend
• Increased arguments with parents, and between parents
• The pressure of expectations from self and others
• Change in parents’ financial status
• Serious illness or injury of a family member
• Pressure at school from teachers, coaches, grades, and homework
• Relationship with family and friends
• *Peers
• *Family /Marital conflict
• *Academic related stress
The Positive Side of Stress: Eustress
• Eustress – kind of stress that is
helpful in promoting one’s growth
and development by providing
sufficient challenges that allow one
to become more resourceful and
show initiative in problem-solving
Coping Strategies and Personal
Ways of Coping with Stress
• Coping is the way people try to deal
with problem, including the problem
of handling the typically negative
emotion-focused coping.
2 broad dimensions of coping:
• Problem-focused coping – dealing
with the actual problems posed by a
stressful situation
• Emotion-focused coping – more
subjective as it considers the
difficulties challenging the feeling
states of the individual, and such
aims to comfort and soothe the
stressed person
• Avoidance coping – is what happens
when one would rather ignore the
stressors or fantasize being in a
different non-stressful circumstance
either of which does not solve the
issue o truly bring about true
relaxation.
• Appraisals – evaluation of what effect
an event can have on one’s well-
being
• A stressful event can be appraised or
considered as a loss, threat, or
challenge.
• Appraisal of loss – harm has already
happened
• Appraisal of threat – anticipation of harm
that could be brought about in the future
• Appraisal of challenge – sees the opportunity
for the stressful event to turn into a positive
outcome and results in a healthier way of
coping (i.e problem solving)
• The more threatening a stressor is appraised,
the feeling of fear and escape, withdrawal,
and support seeking are applied as coping.
• Controllability – extent to which one
can handle or control a situation or
problem, where some stressors
appear to have lower or high
controllability
Stressor (high controllability) = active strategies
& problem solving
Stressor (low controllability) = withdrawal,
mental/cognitive distraction, seek social support,
or respond to reduce emotional distress
• Self Efficacy – one individual
resource, which refers to the
individual’s beliefs about one’s
capacity to exercise influence over
events that affect his/her life
 The Twelve Families of Coping

Family of Coping What are its associated How do they function in What are its related
strategies? the Adaptive Process? behaviors?

Problem Solving Strategizing Adjusts thoughts and Watch and learn Master
Instrumental Action actions to be effective Efficacy
Planning
Information Seeking Reading Find additional Curiosity
Observation contingencies Interest
Asking Others
Helplessness Confusion Find limits of Actions Guilt
Cognitive Interference Helplessness
Cognitive Exhaustion
Escape Behavioral Avoidance Escape non-contingent Drop and roll
Mental Withdrawal environment Flight
Denial Fear
Wishful Thinking
Self-Reliance Emotion regulation Protect available social Tend and befriend Pride
Behavior regulation resources and attend to
Emotional expression goals
Support-Seeking Contract seeking Make use of available social Proximity-seeking
Comfort seeking references Yearning
Instrumental aid Other alliance
Social referencing
Delegation Maladaptive help-seeking Find limits of resources Self-pity
Complaining Shame
Whinning
Self-pity

Social Isolation Social withdrawal Withdraw from unsupportive Duck and cover
Concealments context Freeze
Avoiding others Sadness
Accommodation Distraction Flexibility adjust preferences or Pick and choose
Cognitive restructuring goals to options Secondary control
Minimization
Acceptance
Negotiation Bargaining Find new options or select goals Compromise
Persuasion
Priority-setting
Submission Rumination Give up preferences or goals Disgust
Rigid perseveration Rigid perseverance
Intrusive thoughts
Opposition Other-blame Removed perceived constraints Stands and fight
Projection Anger
Personal Ways of Coping with Stress
1. Tackle the Problem
2. Create a stress journal or include the topic in
your personal journal
3. Develop a “stress relief toolbox”
APA’s How to deal with Stress
1. Understand how you stress
2. Identify your sources of stress
3. Learn your stress signals
4. Recognize how you deal with stress
5. Find healthy ways to manage stress
6. Take care of yourself
7. Reach out for support
LESSON 6: THE POWERS OF THE MIND
• How the brain works
– Frontal lobe = primary motor area ia
located (voluntary movement)
– Temporal lobe = primary auditory area
– Parietal lobe – primary somatosensory
area (sensory signals)
– Occipital lobe – primary visual area
(from thalamus)
 Whole brain theory
• Based on the notion that the entire
brain is active during mental
(cognitive) processing, and there is
interaction among various parts
during mental processes such as
perception theory.
Comparing the right and left hemisphere
 Mind Maps
• A technique where ideas branch from a
central image.
• Helps us remember and understand
information
– Create a central idea
– Add branches to the map
– Add keywords
– Color code the branches
– Include images
 LESSON 7: MENTAL HEALTH AND WELL-
BEING IN MIDDLE & LATE ADOLESCENCE
• Developmental needs important for
children & adolescents (URBIS):
– Physical development
– Social & emotional development
– Peer relationships
– Self-esteem/body image
– Transition to independence
Mental Health & Psychological Well-Being
• Seligman (2011) describes PERMA :
– Positive emotions
– Engagement
– Positive Relationships
– Sense of Meaning, and
– Sense of Accomplishment
 Signs of Mental Distress
• Domains – Signs
– Academic = non-attendance,
deadlines, task incompletion, etc.
– Emotional & Psychological =
confusion, tearful, anxiety, irritability,
etc
– Physical = pale, perspires excessively,
difficulty breathing, etc.
– Behavioral = avoids tasks, withdrawn,
poor hygiene, etc.
Mental Health Concerns in Adolescence
• Depression
• Anxiety
• Conduct disorder
• Self-injury
• Risky sexual behavior
• Substance abuse
• Anti-social behavior
• Identity vs. identity confusion
• Post-traumatic stress (PTSD)
 Getting Support for Mental Health
• Family Members
• Friends, peers
• Teachers
• Counselors
The Road to Psychological Well-Being
• Social skills – understand different
perspectives, empathy, emotional
intelligence, facial expression, impulse
control, and I message.
• Problem Solving skills – identify problem,
brainstorm possible solutions, pros&
cons, best option, & back-up plan.
• Developing Self-esteem (tips p.95)
LESSON 8: EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
• Emotions and communicating emotional
expressions
– 2 ways to exhibit:
• Voluntary – avoid people when
uncomfortable, or smile
• Involuntary – one’s facial expression
– Ekman and Rosenthal (1997) impulses
are always sent to facial muscles when
emotion is felt
 EMOTIONAL EXPRESSIONS
• Primary emotions (basic emotions) – innate
emotions that are experienced for short periods of time
and appear rapidly, usually as a reaction to an outside
stimulus,
• e.g. joy, distress, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust.

• Secondary emotions –require higher order thinking,

not reflexive; develops overtime and take longer to fade,
influenced by thoughts and has to be managed for people
to become more competent communicators.
• e.g. love, guilt, shame, embarrassment, pride, envy, and
jealousy.
• Emotional sharing – communication
of our thoughts and feelings following
an emotional episode.
• Intensity - People experience
emotions at different levels of
intensity.
POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE EMOTIONS

• Positive emotions – are pleasant and

provide one with a good feeling
• Negative emotions – unpleasant and
cause feeling of discomfort
 HOW TO MANAGE EMOTIONS?
• Emotional intelligence (EI) - a set of skills
for processing emotional information and
using this information to guide one’s
thinking and actions.

• Peter Salovey and Jon D. Mayer (1990) -

a form of social intelligence that involves
the ability to monitor one’s own and
others’ feelings and emotion.
• Daniel Goleman – understanding
one’s feelings, empathy for the
feelings of others and the regulation
of emotion in a way that enhances
living.

• Self-awareness – key component of

intelligence.
 PERSONAL SKILLS/COMPETENCIES
1. Self-awareness – being aware of emotion
– Emotional awareness – recognize
one’s own emotion and their effects
– Accurate Self-Assessment – good
understanding of one’s
strengths/weaknesses
– Self-confidence – strong sense of self
worth
2. Self-regulation or self management –
manage emotion appropriately
– Self –control – recognize and control emotion
appropriately
– Trustworthiness – maintain integrity
– Conscientiousness – taking responsibility for
personal performance
– Adaptability – flexible in response to change
– Innovation – open to different and new ideas

3. Self motivation – force that drives

one to do things
 SOCIAL SKILLS/INTERPERSONAL
COMPETENCIES
• Used to interact and handle relationships
– Empathy
• Learn to listen effectively
• Ask questions
• Learn to respect the feelings of others
– Social skills – skills to effectively
handle and influence others people’s
emotions.
 MORE EMOTIONAL SKILLS
1. Writing about one’s emotional
experiences
• Cathartic
• Incoherent experiences make
sense
2. Practice of mindfulness
• Mindfulness – awareness that
emerges through paying attention on
purpose, in the present moment and
non-judgmentally to the unfolding of
experiences moment by moment.
• Increase self-awareness
– Three-minute check-in
– Inner-States-Diary
 Homework: for next meeting
• Bring any current/past issue of an
article concerning mental health of
adolescence.
• Print the article in a short size bond
paper.
• You may include a picture of this issue.
• Make sure to get the source of the
article and read.
 Study: for next meeting
• Steps in making the mind map
• Families of coping
• Mental health concerns in Adolescence
•