Question

An individual has been employed at a desk job for a number of years. She has been experiencing increased amounts of stress since her employment. Through venting about her various qualms with the workplace to her husband, she hoped to improve her mental health. However, after some time, she realized that her stress levels remained the same. Deciding to try something different, she resolved to jog for thirty minutes every day once she returned from work. After some time, she discovered that her stress levels had decreased. What stress coping or stress management technique(s) did she use to successfully accomplish this ?

• A. Physical exercise alone
• B. Physical exercise and perceived control
• C. Physical exercise and social support
• D. Physical exercise and cognitive flexibility

Answer 1

Answer:

D. Physical exercise and cognitive flexibility

• Jogging every day is an example of physical exercise.
• Social support is the use of deep interpersonal relationships to deal with stress. Her attempt to communicate with her husband (social support) failed to decrease her stress.
• Cognitive flexibility in terms of stress is the ability to understand and reformulate approaches to stress if the current methods being utilized aren’t working. The individual did this prior to making the decision to jog every day.
• So, she used both cognitive flexibility and physical exercise.