{"id":14224,"date":"2021-08-18T11:03:32","date_gmt":"2021-08-18T02:03:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/themantic-education.com\/ibpsych\/?p=14224"},"modified":"2021-08-18T14:28:24","modified_gmt":"2021-08-18T05:28:24","slug":"key-studies-workplace-stress-status-and-the-whitehall-studies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themantic-education.com\/ibpsych\/2021\/08\/18\/key-studies-workplace-stress-status-and-the-whitehall-studies\/","title":{"rendered":"Key Studies: Workplace stress, status and the Whitehall Studies"},"content":{"rendered":"

This material was in the first draft of \u201cStress: A Student\u2019s Guide to IB Health Psychology<\/a>.\u201d It was removed from the final edition in favour of studies about teenagers. The information is here instead as extra optional content for extended and\/or interested students.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Executive Stress Syndrome Hypothesis<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In the 1950s and 1960s, psychologists thought that high-ranking individuals had higher stress. This was called \u201cthe executive stress syndrome\u201d<\/strong> (Sapolsky, 2005). But studies like Sapolsky\u2019s baboon research<\/a> helped discredit the executive stress syndrome hypothesis and showed that lower status is linked with higher stress. However, the current consensus is that status is only linked with stress when it affects the number of stressors you are exposed to. Even then, it\u2019s not that simple \u2013 behavioural, personality and social factors can affect our individual responses to the same stressors.<\/p>\n

Human vs Animal Studies<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Olive baboons are social animals with clearly defined hierarchies, like humans. This is why they are valuable to study when it comes to social status and stress. (Credit: Stolz Gary M, USFWS, pixnio.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

Does the same apply to humans? Human studies on status and stress are more difficult to conduct than animal studies. First of all, there are many variables that make it difficult to isolate and define a human\u2019s social status. This is because we belong to many different social groups and have many opportunities to have a high (or low) rank. A person could have a minimum wage job with three bosses, but also be the captain of a sports team. A high school kid might feel like an outsider with few friends at school but have thousands of followers on social media. Monkeys don\u2019t have these same opportunities \u2013 their rank in their troop\u2019s hierarchy is the only rank they know.<\/p>\n

Another reason why humans are different to animals is that our status is not always directly related to acquiring the bare essentials for life, like having enough food to eat (Sapolsky, 2012). This is especially true in modern societies. For example, Jeff Bezos can easily acquire 2,500 calories to eat for the day and a bed to sleep in, but so can his lowest paid employee. In monkey troops, status has a more direct effect on seriously stressful situations like access to food and surviving predators by staying with the group. Therefore, the relationship between status and stress is different in human populations compared to animal populations. That being said, with carefully designed studies we can still study how status affects stress in humans.<\/p>\n

Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n