How Do Claremont and La Verne Residents Handle Stress?

Here's some news that may not come as a surprise to the thousands of students that stream in and out of the University of La Verne and the Claremont colleges.

A study finds that people who are stressed and tired are likely to default to learned habits, good or bad, and that lack of control does not automatically lead people to indulgence or hedonism.

In five experiments appearing in the June issue of the "Journal of Personality and Social Psychology," researchers led by Wendy Wood and David Neal of the University of Southern California found that under various types of stress, different types of habits got stronger.

In one experiment, Wood and her co-investigators followed students for a semester. They found that during testing periods, when students were stressed and sleep-deprived, they were even more likely to stick to old habits. It was as if they didn't have the energy to to do something new, according to Wood.

"When we try to change our behavior, we strategize about our motivation and self-control. But what we should be thinking about instead is how to set up new habits. Habits persist even when we're tired and don't have the energy to exert self-control," Wood said. Aimee Drolet of UCLA was a co-author of the study.

-- City News Service