Environmental Stressors

What is Environmental Stress ?

Since the time Hans (Selye, 1950) first presented the idea of stress as
the non-specific response of the body to any demand’’, there have
been numerous fitting analysis of the idea, and attempts to explain its
significance.
Environmental stress refers to the emotional, behavioral and cognitive
reaction to stimuli in the environment that cause stress.
An environmental stimulus that is upsetting for one individual in a
specific environment may not be distressing for another or for the
same individual in an alternate environment. All things considered,
environmental stress is a communication between an individual and
an external stimuli.
 Environmental Stressors

Environmental stressors cause stress and result in the reduction of productivity,

reproductive success, and ecosystem development. Stressors influence all
organisms and their populations, communities, and ecoscapes (landscape and
seascapes). Stressors might be natural in origin, being related to such
environmental impacts as:
 competition, predation, disease, and other interactions among organisms
 constraints related to climate or to inadequate or excessive nutrients, moisture, or space
 disturbances such as wildfires and windstorms
 Environmental Stressors

They can have immediate as well as long-term effects on the people

and repercussions that are seen to prevail over a long period of time.
Stressors that are seen as threatening may prompt stress responses
including physiological, emotional, and behavioural components,
which may, in turn, evoke strategies intended to adapt to and possibly
adjust to the threat.
 Environmental Stressors

Ecological stress may occur as an intense, short-lived event of destruction,

otherwise called a disturbance.
Stressors may exert their influence throughout an all-encompassing
timeframe – that is, in a chronic manner.
The interaction of organisms with a stressor at a particular place and time is
called exposure.
Damage happens when one stressor or more than one stressor elicits
reactions that can be deciphered as degradation of environmental quality.
 Categories of Environmental Stressors

Environmental stressors are typically considered to be

categorized as one of four categories:
Upsetting life events- Short duration, lasting/prolonged negative
impact
Daily hassles- Chronic, less intensity, high frequency
Cataclysmic events- Sudden, abrupt
Ambient stressors- Chronic, uncontrollable, run in background
 Dimensions of Environmental Stressors

Level of controllability over the environmental stressor.

Predictability of the stressor
Intensity of the salient or identifiable stressor
Duration of the stressor
 Types of Environmental Stressors

 Physical stress
 Wildfire
 Chemical Pollution
 Thermal contamination
 Radiation
 Climate pressure
 Biological Stressor
 Bio-pollution
 Ecological Responses
 An environment that has been influenced by disturbance normally suffers
mortality among its species, alongside harm to its primary properties and
functional attributes.
 Chronic stressors work throughout longer time frames and they incorporate
climatic elements and numerous sorts of chemical and thermal contaminations.
 Exposure to a higher intensity of ecological stressors can bring about
evolutionary changes if individual living beings shift and vary in tolerance and
those distinctions are based on heredity.
 A prolonged strengthening or intensification of stress will cause long-term
environmental change to happen.
 Biological systems that are constantly presented with extreme stress, ultimately
stabilize.
 Natural disasters

Natural disasters are catastrophic events that result from any of the Earth’s
natural phenomena.
A natural disaster can be characterized as:
 “A significant event brought by the natural processes of the Earth that makes widespread
destruction to the environment and death toll.”
These are infrequent, caused by natural forces, not under control of humans,
cause damage or death, unpredictable.
They are measured in terms of destruction and disruption they create.
 Natural Disasters
 Heat wave - A period of excessively hot weather. A heat wave can have devastating effects
on crops, animals and people. Extreme heat can often contribute to other natural disasters
such as droughts (prolonged shortage of water).
 Flood – When an area or land, that is usually dry, becomes submerged in water. Floods
can be caused by an overflow of a body of water such as a river or lake, or by excessive
amounts of rainfall over a short period of time.
 Hurricane/Cyclone/Typhoons – Hurricanes are tropical storms that form over the North
Atlantic Ocean and Northeast Pacific. Cyclones are formed over the South Pacific and
Indian Ocean. Typhoons are formed over the Northwest Pacific Ocean.
 Tsunami – a series of huge waves caused by an earthquake or volcano under the sea.
 Earthquake – the sudden movement of the Earth’s crusts (its outer layer).
 Volcanic eruption – when lava and gas erupt from a vent in a volcano.
 Characteristics of Natural Disasters
 Sudden
 Unpredictable
 Uncontrollable
 Enormous destructive power
 Acute
 Duration – low point
 Warning-
 Life threat
 Injury
Perception of Natural Disasters

The crisis effect

The Levee effect
Adaptation
Wellbeing and resource use
Personality- LoC
 Effects of Natural Disasters
The impacts can be classified as direct or indirect losses.
Direct losses are identified with actual harm, reflected in the number of
casualties, in harm to the foundation of public administrations, harm to
buildings, the metropolitan zone, industry, exchange, and disintegration of the
environment, that is, actual modification of the environment.
The indirect loss can ordinarily be classified into social impacts like the
interference of transportation, public administration, and the media, and the
negative picture that an area may secure regarding others; and monetary
impacts like interruption of exchange and industry as an outcome of the
decrease in production, disincentives for investment, and the cost of
rehabilitation and restoration.
 Theory of Conservation of
Resources(COR) & Disasters
It was proposed by Hobfoll in 1989.
Conservation of resources (COR) theory offers a framework within which to
understand responses to stress and suggests that stress results from
circumstances involving threatened or actual loss of valued resources.
 It is the desire to defend, conserve, and acquire these valued resources
which motivate human behavior in the face of stress.
According to COR theory, loss is more salient than gain, and loss begets
loss.
 Principles of COR

COR theory begins with the tenet that individuals strive to obtain, retain,
foster, and protect those things they centrally value.
The first principle of COR theory is that resource loss is disproportionately more
salient than resource gain.
The second principle of COR theory is that people must invest resources in
order to protect against resource loss, recover from losses, and gain resources.
 Issues related to Natural Disasters

Humanitarian Crises- Environmental Refugees, Migrants,

Public Health Issues- Disasters cause substantial distress, mental health
problems, and psychiatric impairment(PTSD, Depression, Anxiety, etc.), epidemics,
communicable diseases, etc.
Environmental Problems- Spreading pollution and waste, or essentially
demolishing habitats.
Infrastructural Damage- Physical structures in housing, industry, trade, and
public administrations.
 TECHNOLOGICAL CATASTROPHE

 Disaster attributed, to a limited extent or altogether, to human intent, mistake, negligence, or

involving a failure of a man-made system, bringing about critical injuries or deaths is called
technological catastrophe or natural catastrophe.
 Technological disasters include structural collapses, like bridges, mines, and structures, as
well as modern mishaps, like chemical and atomic bomb explosions.
 Technological disasters include transport mishaps, mishaps in manufacturing units, blasts,
chemical substance leaks, etc.
 Characteristics of Technological Disasters
Technological disasters can be viewed as manmade disasters which means there
is an “identifiable cause” characteristic.
 The threat cannot be envisioned. A technological disaster is abrupt, sudden, and variable.
 People are responsible. Casualties or victims of technological disasters will in general feel
outraged toward individuals who were answerable and responsible for the accidents that
may have been prevented.
 Community breakdowns and conflicts may take place. Technological disasters can give rise
to disputes within communities.
 Longer Recovery—Community members will in general focus on litigation and blame, and
less on cleanup and recovery
 Media Exposure—Media covering a technological disaster can add to already high levels of
stress and anxiety
 BHOPAL GAS TRAGEDY
 On the night of December 2, 1984, the chemical, methyl isocyanate (MIC) spilled out from
Union Carbide India Ltd’s (UCIL’s) pesticide factory and turned the city of Bhopal into a
colossal gas chamber. It was India's first major industrial disaster. At least 30 tonnes of
methyl isocyanate gas killed more than 15,000 people and affected over 600,000 workers. The
Bhopal gas tragedy is known as the world's worst industrial disaster.
 Impact of methyl isocyanate leak- Impact on health
 Immediate health effects include ulcers, photophobia, respiratory issues, anorexia, persistent abdominal
pain, genetic issue, neuroses, impaired audio and visual memory, impaired reasoning ability, and a lot more.
 Long-term health effects include chronic conjunctivitis, decreased lung function, increased pregnancy loss,
increased infant mortality, increased chromosomal abnormalities, impaired associate learning and more.
 Chernobyl Nuclear Accident ( Ukraine, 1986)
• The Chornobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed reactor design that was operated with
inadequately trained personnel. The resulting steam explosion and fires released at least 5% of the
radioactive reactor core into the environment, with the deposition of radioactive materials in many parts of
Europe.
• Two Chernobyl plant workers died due to the explosion on the night of the accident, and a further 28 people
died within a few weeks as a result of acute radiation syndrome.
• The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation has concluded that, apart from
some 5000 thyroid cancers (resulting in 15 fatalities), "there is no evidence of a major public health impact
attributable to radiation exposure 20 years after the accident."
• Some 350,000 people were evacuated as a result of the accident, but resettlement of areas from which
people were relocated is ongoing.
• The Chernobyl disaster was a unique event and the only accident in the history of commercial nuclear power
where radiation-related fatalities occurred.
 Differences
Natural Disasters Technological Disasters
 Inherently uncontrollable  Occasional Loss over something
which is not usual
 Great deal of destruction
 Lack of visible destruction
 Begin quickly are powerful and
regular  Less familiar, occur less and are
widespread
 Predictable, occur at known
places  Cannot be forecasted/Predicted
 Come with warnings  Are sudden with no warning
 Have a low point  May or may not have a low point
 Post disaster community  Post disaster community
response- mostly positive response- may be
negative/positive