IS STRESS CONTAGIOUS? Even the most idiosyncratic soul is born to conform. When others laugh, our mouths upturn into smiles. When the person next to you yawns, chances are youre going to break off a tonsil-rattling exhale, too. And when your stressed-out colleague is demanding a meeting right now, the alarmed face quickly incites yours to mimic it. Now youre stressed, too. So much for free will. We all have a copycat streak, thanks to social circuitry that makes us yawn and panic when others do. As a social animal, we are built to relate to others, so much so that we physically reflect back their expressions and movements. The urge to echo is triggered by what are known as mirror neurons, brain cells that mimic the actions or emotions of others. While they help the species learn, understand, and bond, they can also be your undoing when the channeled behavior is the emotional contagion of stress. Mirror neurons are thought to operate similarly in humans. Located near motor neurons responsible for movement, speech, and intention to act, they simulate the actions and emotions of others or give us the impulse to do so -- thus, one of lifes great mysteries, the contagious yawn. Youre not remotely sleepy, but you cut loose with a jaw-popper after the person next to you has done the same. Even if were not physically imitating what we see, mirror neurons still fire off a simulated version of the activity in your head as if you actually did it. Its all designed to help us learn, understand, empathize, and connect with what others are doing and feeling. Too often, though, whats mirrored is the stress of coworkers, managers and significant others. Researchers have long known about the infectious nature of stress. Pass-along strain runs rampant in relationships and work settings. Studies have shown that there is crossover stress from one spouse to the other, between coworkers, and spill over from the work domain to home. The stress contagion effect, as its known, spreads anxiety like a virus. Our mirror neurons help suck us into the emotional eruptions of others. Stress suppresses the immune system, lowers the good cholesterol, increases the bad, and leaves decision making up to a hysterical corner of your ancient brain that cant compute the social stressors of the modern world. It can lead to any number of illnesses and conditions, from insomnia to cardiovascular disease to heart attacks. Its a health emergency that kills more people than traffic accidents or nicotine and could be alleviated with proactive stress screening, advice doctors seldom prescribe. The key to resisting the emotional contagion of stress is overriding the double-team autopilot of the stress response -- reacting before you think -- and your mirror neurons. When someone dumps emotional toxins on you, you can choose not to accept the incoming by catching yourself when the bogus, catastrophic story of stress goes off and activates a wave of stupefying emotion. Instead of latching on to the fear or panic because its in your head, contest it by reframing the irrational story to whats actually the reality. Stress is the result of the story we tell ourselves. That requires that we dispute the stress of the addled colleague who expects an instant response to her email. She will hear from you -- when youre able. Refuse the frenzy of someone elses deadline by stepping back and identifying the real story -- its not an emergency, its not your stress, its not a crisis--and by using proven stress management processes, from progressive relaxation to meditation, to turn off the false danger signal. Instead of mirror neurons reflecting stress, you can use them as a tool to better understand why a person is going off, and, as a result, why you dont have to. We can let others know that we would prefer to be dealt with in a way that doesnt treat every event as Apocalypse Now or threaten our health. Others dont know theyre as much of a conduit for stress as a fiber optic cable is for data. Let them know. Reduce the interactions you can with the stress conductors in your life.
Posted on: Wed, 23 Oct 2013 14:57:16 +0000
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