Taking Care Of Your Mental Health & How Stress Can Affect Us - IELTS Reading Answers & Explanations

Read the text below and answer questions 15-21.

Taking care of your mental health

A Everyone at some point can feel worried or anxious, homesick or isolated because they don't fit in. This often happens when you change your location or when changes happen to you, and the truth is that this happens to lots of people; it's a normal part of life. It's been recognised that around one third of students will experience poor mental health during their studies. Studying with us is no different but we recognise that taking care of your mental health and physical well-being is necessary for a successful college experience.

B College counselling services can help you maintain a healthy psychological outlook when things get difficult. We offer individual support and face-to-face counselling sessions, individual drop-in sessions, as well as workshops and short courses. There's lots of support for you at the college and this brief guide gives you advice on looking after your mental health and where you can get support if you need it. So, what can you do to look after your mental health when you're facing difficulties?

C People need people and a network of friends and family is extremely important. Your studies will take up a lot of your time and it's easy to become too focused on your academic work to the exclusion of normal life and other people, particularly around exam and assessment periods. Put aside time to talk to family and friends and identify ways to make new friends, but don't forget to take an interest in your old friends and ask them how they are and what they're doing.

D Physical fitness is closely connected to well-being. Exercise releases chemicals in your brain that can positively change your mood. Having goals or challenges linked to physical activity can also improve your mental well-being by enhancing feelings of control, self-esteem and efficiency. Do some physical activity that suits you and that you enjoy but if you don't go to the gym or do a sport, at least you could use the stairs when you go upstairs, go for a walk at lunchtime or get off the bus one stop before your usual one and walk the rest of the way.

E Greater awareness of what's happening at the moment can improve your mental well-being. This involves taking notice of your thoughts and feelings, your body and other things around you. Taking up a free-time activity like music, yoga, walking or hiking can relax and calm you and focus you on what's happening now.

F Doing something kind for someone is also a great way to increase your feelings of well-being. Research shows that doing something for another person once a week for six weeks is associated with an increase in happiness. Try doing something for a friend or relative, volunteer to help with something and tell people around you that you appreciate them. They might say the same thing back to you!

G Research shows that learning new skills improves your self-esteem, gives you a sense of direction and helps you to connect with others. Like doing physical activity, learning new things gives you a challenge and a focus away from the things you're doing day to day. Make sure your new skill is broken down stage by stage and that these stages are easily achieved so that you feel a sense of accomplishment. How about learning to play a new sport, taking up a hobby like cooking, or helping someone with their interest?

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Read the text below and answer questions 22-28

How stress can affect us

It is quite normal to feel under pressure, and pressure can sometimes be a positive force: it can make us feel energised, take action and get results. But if the pressure becomes too much and we tip over into feeling stressed, then it can have a negative impact on us and our health. We refer to this state as stress. However, because stress is a very subjective phenomenon, it lacks a precise medical definition and can mean different things in different contexts. We might talk about stressful situations when we have lots to do or worry about and don't have any control over what is happening. Alternatively, we might talk about how we feel when we are anxious or under pressure.

Although stress isn't a mental condition, it can lead to mental health problems or make existing problems deteriorate. If, for example, it is difficult for us to manage our stress, we could become anxious or depressed. The former is when we are worried, tense or afraid about things that could happen in the future and is a natural response when we believe that we are under threat. Depression is a mental state in which we feel isolated, are unable to relate to other people and, among other things, lack self-confidence. Then we find coping with daily life hard and may avoid communication with other people, which makes the problems of stress worse.

Tiredness, headaches or an upset stomach could be the first physical clues that we are stressed. We often find it hard to sleep or eat well, and a poor diet and lack of sleep can affect our physical health. When we are in poor health, this, in turn, can make us feel more stressed emotionally.

Stress is a natural response to a threat, often referred to as the fight, flight or freeze response. Humans, like other animals, have instinctive ways of reacting to physical dangers such as being chased by a wild animal, and when we are threatened, our bodies release the hormones cortisol, norepinephrine and adrenaline. These hormones make us more alert so that we can react faster either to fight for our lives or to run away from the danger, and they make our hearts beat more quickly so that blood is sent to where it is needed most. After the threat has passed, our bodies release other hormones to help our muscles relax. Cortisol, norepinephrine and adrenaline can also be produced when we feel emotionally threatened in stressful situations, but they may take a long time to return to normal levels. The long-term activation of the stress-response system and the overexposure to stress hormones that follows can disrupt almost all the body's processes and leave us at increased risk of many health problems. This can make us feel physically unwell and could affect our health in the longer term.