Behav Med
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Talking effect and white coat phenomenon in hypertensive patients.
Both white coat effect (the tendency of blood pressure to rise during a medical visit) and talking effect were analyzed in 42 patients with essential hypertension. Blood pressure was measured during the clinic visit and over the subsequent 24-hour ambulatory period, with the physician performing 49 +/- 4 measurements for each patient. Three silent periods and two talking periods (stress and relaxation) were randomly allocated in a crossover design and studied, using analysis of variance. ⋯ Measures of systolic/diastolic blood pressure were higher during stressful talking than during relaxed talking. The talking and its emotional contents seemed to explain 70% of the white coat phenomenon. To minimize the white coat phenomenon in the clinic, physicians, nurses, and clinicians are advised to measure blood pressure during an initial period of silence.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Effect of chronic aerobic exercise and progressive relaxation on motor performance and affect following acute stress.
The effects of a 10-week aerobic exercise and progressive relaxation training program on somatic, emotional, and behavioral responses to acute stress, as determined by quality of motor performance and affect, were examined. The participants consisted of 60 unfit male university undergraduate students with no previous training in stress management who were randomly and evenly assigned to engage in one of four treatments over 10 weeks: (a) moderate aerobic exercise, (b) progressive relaxation, (c) a placebo group that engaged in group discussion but did experience acute stress, and (d) a nonintervention control group that did not experience stress while performing the motor task. Acute stress consisted of "losing" against a competitor of the opposite sex on the criterion motor task while receiving unpleasant information about their performance over 30 preintervention and 30 postintervention trials. ⋯ Progressive relaxation markedly reduced systolic blood pressure but did not favorably influence performance or affect in response to acute stress. Placebo and control groups were statistically similar on all measures. The findings indicated support for the use of chronic aerobic exercise as a strategy for improved coping with acute stress.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Stress effects of personal control over hospital noise.
Hospital critical care unit (CCU) sounds, instruction in personal control over noise, and stress were studied in 105 female volunteers attempting to sleep overnight in a simulated hospital environment. Subjects were randomly assigned to three groups--instruction in personal control over noise, no instruction in personal control over noise, or a quiet condition. The two noise conditions heard audiotaped recorded playback of CCU nighttime sounds. ⋯ The results of group comparisons provided strong support for a causal relationship between CCU sounds and greater subjective stress (p less than .000) but not for physiological stress measured by urinary epinephrine. As predicted, scores for sensitivity of the person to noise were positively correlated with scores for noise-induced subjective stress (r = .226, p less than .05). Hierarchical multiple regression revealed that CCU sound levels independently accounted for 54% (p less than .001) and sensitivity to noise for 5% (p less than .01) of the variance in subjective stress.