Summary: Viewing stress as a potential motivator can improve productivity and wellbeing without reducing empathy or willingness to support others. Researchers developed a brief online intervention that teaches participants to reframe stress more positively using education and visualization techniques.
Despite concerns that this approach might lead to emotional detachment or less support for others, participants remained just as attuned to others’ distress and likely to help. These findings support the use of stress mindset interventions to enhance performance without compromising interpersonal relationships.
Key Facts:
- Mindset Shift: Viewing stress as a challenge rather than a threat improves coping and motivation.
- No Empathy Loss: Participants who reframed stress were equally likely to support others in distress.
- Practical Tool: A 15-minute online intervention effectively shifted participants’ stress mindset.
Source: Griffin University
Harnessing stress effectively can help boost an individual’s productivity or motivation levels, with a new Griffith University study allaying fears the technique could negatively affect feelings of empathy or willingness to support others.
Dr Jacob Keech is an expert in stress management and has been researching stress mindset — the way people perceive and believe stress affects them — since 2014, with the aim of improving people’s wellbeing and performance when faced with stress.
While stress has long been viewed in a negative light, recent research has suggested reframing it as a potential motivator can lead to better outcomes, including improved problem-solving skills and personal growth.
With this in mind, Dr Keech developed a stress mindset intervention — a 15-minute, online program where participants are first educated about the positive and negative aspects of stress, then taken through a series of imagery-based exercises where they visualise the positive consequences of stress in their own lives.
“Stress mindset interventions have shown promise in helping individuals manage their own stress more effectively,” Dr Keech said.
“There are likely to be benefits of viewing stress in a more balanced way, considering both the positives and the negatives, as opposed to strictly negative.”
Since starting his research however, questions have been raised as to whether there could be negative consequences to viewing stress as a productivity booster, in particular regard to managers putting undue pressure on their staff.
“The idea that fostering a more positive stress mindset could lead people to downplay the struggles of others or be less supportive is an important concern,” Dr Keech said.
“Our findings suggest this is not the case though.”
Participants who underwent the stress mindset intervention were asked to evaluate the distress levels of a close friend and a colleague in hypothetical scenarios and indicate their likelihood of providing support.
The results showed participants in the intervention group were equally receptive to others’ stress and just as likely to offer assistance.
“While it may be beneficial to embrace stress as a motivational tool for personal growth, we must always be cautious not to overload others with stress, especially in managerial roles,” Dr Keech said.
“Our study showed we can promote a healthier mindset towards stress without creating negative consequences for the social or emotional wellbeing of those around us.”
The results of the study were recently published in the International Journal of Stress Management, contributing to the growing evidence supporting the use of stress mindset interventions to improve individual wellbeing and performance, while alleviating concerns of negative impacts on interpersonal relationships.
About this stress and empathy research news
Author: Christine Bowley
Source: Griffin University
Contact: Christine Bowley – Griffin University
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“Stress for Success” by Jacob Keech et al. International Journal of Stress Management
Abstract
Stress for Success
Interventions aimed at promoting a mindset that stress can be enhancing appear to benefit individuals by buffering the impacts of stress on health and performance.
However, recent evidence has suggested that while stress mindset interventions may produce favorable intrapersonal outcomes, they may have unintended interpersonal consequences.
This study examined the impact of a stress mindset intervention on perceptions of others’ stress and intentions to provide social support. A preregistered 2 × 2 mixed experimental design was adopted, testing three models.
Participants were randomized (N = 176; 76% female) into an intervention or control group (between-subjects factor in all models).
In an online survey, participants completed self-report measures of stress mindset and rated their perceptions of distress and their social support intentions, toward a close friend and a colleague, in two hypothetical scenarios. Stress mindset was the within-subjects factor in the first model.
Relationship type was the counterbalanced within-subjects factor in the second and third models.
The intervention yielded a significant large effect on stress mindset. No significant differences in stress perceptions or social support intentions emerged between the groups.
Contrary to previous findings, we did not find evidence that promoting the mindset that stress can be enhancing alters the way people perceive and intend to respond to others’ stress.
Hence, current findings support stress mindset interventions as valuable for stress management and provide directions for future research and practice.
