e, stress is the nonspecific response of the body to any demand (Kaplan and Sadock, 1990).
This expanded concept of stress contains three levels: (1) the environment; (2) the organism's appraisal and evaluation of the environment; and (3) the organism's reaction to the environment (Woolfolk and Richardson, 1988). An organism appraises and evaluates the environment as threatening, helpful, or neutral. Responses on the part of an organism may be psychological, physiological, or both (Woolfolk and Richardson, 1988). This perception of stress was significant in several ways. One of the most important was the recognition that it was not the actual harmfulness of a stressor which was the only way in which a stressor could cause damage. The perception of harmfulness could also cause damage.
In the 1960s, the idea was introduced that the quantity of stress, as well as the quality of stress (perceived or actual), affect both the probability and the extent of damage from stress (Kaplan and Sadock, 1990). It was reported that the risk of impairment bears a linear relationship to the number of stresses, and that the greater the life stress, the greater the deformation or disturbance of the human material being put to the t
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