Americans are stressed and the problem seems to be getting worse. According to the 2018 Stress in America survey by the American Psychology Association, Americans are suffering from significantly high levels of stress.
The Stress in America survey, an annual survey conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of the APA, was carried out between July 27 and August 28, 2018. Up to 3,458 American adults over the age of 18 participated in the survey.
More than 90% of survey respondents reported suffering from physical symptoms of stress and over 50% reported being depressed, lacking energy, or lacking motivation. Two-thirds of survey respondents reported extraordinarily high levels of stress about politics and the future of the United States.
Most notable were stress levels among Generation Z, Americans between the ages of 15 and 21. One-third of Generation Z respondents reported stress about basic life necessities such as housing stability, hunger, and money. Generation Z also scored high for stress associated with fear of school shootings.
College-aged Americans, in particular, are struggling the hardest with problems such as anxiety, depression, eating disorders, attention difficulties, and suicidal behaviors.
Much stress and anxiety experienced by Americans are directly related to fear of one’s financial future. For instance, the average price of a nursing facility in Long Island is $15,000 a month, yet one in three American adults has less than $5,000 saved up for retirement.
What’s more, only 39% of Americans have enough money to cover a $1,000 emergency such as a co-pay to the emergency room or a repair on one’s vehicle. Up 80% of bumper scratches alone happen when a driver is parking their own car.
But, this doesn’t mean that Americans aren’t saving. On the contrary, 92% of Americans say that vacations are important to them and yet one in four U.S. workers will leave half their vacation days on the table this year. Though it might not seem like this, this can actually hinder an individual’s productivity at work. In fact, professional services firm Ernst & Young conducted an internal study of its employees and found that for each additional 10 hours of vacation time employees took, their year-end performance ratings improved 8%.
One of the reasons for this is lagging wage growth. Although Americans’ paychecks have increased significantly over the last 40 years, the purchasing power of their wages have barely shifted at all.
These financial struggles along with regular exposure to negative news via social media, the Internet, and Television can cause high levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. This is especially true when people don’t have the coping mechanisms to deal with stress in a healthy way.
In fact, Americans are more likely to suffer from heartburn during the holiday season because they’re more likely to cope with stress by overeating despite weight being the number one insecurity for American adults.
“We do know that stress is on the rise in America,” said A. Janet Tomiyama, an associate professor of psychology and director of the Dieting, Stress, and Health Lab at UCLA, in an interview with Vox.
“The political situation feels really big and really uncontrollable, we know that kind of stress is really potent, and we know that that’s the kind of stress that increases the stress hormone cortisol, and cortisol is what makes you reach for these comfort foods,” said Tomiyama. “So I see a direct path between stress increasing and stress eating increasing.”
The good news is that, by developing healthy coping mechanisms, Americans may be able to keep the physical symptoms of stress at bay. You can also reduce stress by taking frequent breaks from social media and news content when you begin to feel overwhelmed.
