Thursday, February 4th 2010

By Lindsay Jolivet

LINDSAY JOLIVET

INSIDEOUT EDITOR

When students are stressed out, they don’t always deal with it in healthy ways. They head to the computer, the television, a bottle of wine. And the problem is most likely not that they haven’t been told how to deal with it.

In general, students know they should sleep eight hours, eat well and exercise. However, at the risk of sounding whiny, it isn’t always that simple. Debbie Nifakis, clinical director for the Centre for Student Development and psychologist helped to clarify a few issues about stress. When it comes to well-known advice that simply is not followed, she recommended starting with baby steps.

“Most students don’t sleep their regular hours and they’re not always eating properly and that’s all par for the course, but it’s when it becomes excessive you need to be able to know yourself and what are the things that are affecting you the most,” she advised. Start with the biggest issue instead of tackling all your life stressors at once.

One of the biggest reasons students do not deal appropriately with their stress is simply that they are overwhelmed with stressors, including readings, projects, exams and sometimes part-time jobs. On the Canadian Campus Survey in 2004 one third of Canadian undergrads said they experience symptoms of elevated psychological stress. These include feeling constantly stressed out, losing sleep and feeling unhappy and depressed.

However, resolving the issue is not about thinking of yourself as just one more stressed out student. Said Nifakis, “It’s a lot less about okay, follow these 10 steps and you’re going to be fine and more about individualizing what the issues are for the individual person.”

One of the most important aspects of stress relief is leisure time. Someone with five projects and two presentations to get through in a few weeks might think taking a break to go for coffee is insane. Nifakis believes balance is important. “I think what often happens when students get stressed, or when anybody gets stressed, is that there is an imbalance between things that give us pleasure and make us feel good and the…daily things that wear us down.”

Making time for friends, family and you is firstly about getting organized, which Nifakis said is one of the biggest problems students have. Once students feel on top of everything, the ball of wool begins to unroll. Organization leaves room for leisure, which improves psychological well-being.

Having a support network is also important. “If you [have] good friends or family to spend time with, or you get away and do things socially that is a huge stress reliever, because we get a lot of energy from interactions with other people. Our social connections are a protective factor against stress.”

Those without someone to tell about their bad day may not be more stressed than anyone else, but they will have a harder time dealing with that stress, she explained. This is not to undermine the benefit of leisure time alone. Reading a book or going for a walk are also great ways wind down. The important thing is to do something that makes you happy (and then of course writing the essay; can’t skip that).

Social interaction does, however, have undeniable benefits. For example, campus health’s online resource urges the importance of laughter. A nice thought, right? Actually, it is much more than that. Nifakis assured that a host of empirical evidence supports the psychological benefits of laughter, although students will probably not write “laughter” after Math in their agendas. This type of stress relief comes indirectly from developing a lifestyle that leaves room for fun. “When you’re with friends who you have a good time with and tend to have a really good laugh [with], those kinds of things are priceless, really, in terms of dealing with stress.”

People will seek out things that they enjoy if they stay in touch with their feelings. These tendencies are visible in emotions as simple as feeling like watching a funny movie instead of a sad one. The key is to pay attention to these signals.

A potential trap in stress-relief is spending too much time on the internet. While the issue of internet social lives is complicated and relatively new, one thing is certain—it is not the same as real life interaction. Although, Nifakis noted, social networking sites like Facebook might be valuable for those who are shy, because it is some form of connection to others.

She added, “I worry about people [who’s] idea of a social connection is being on Facebook or MSN…if they’re never going out and they’re doing all their socializing on the internet.” Overall, though, she did not think the internet was a negative influence, and held, “we need to figure out how to make it work for us and not against us.”

Stress-relief begins with time management and ends with a deep breath. For those who need more breaks, or who aren’t quite sure how they’ve survived thus far, note the impact of stepping away from stressors and seeking refuge with friends, in community, and in laughter.