How We Develop Stress Responses: A Family Perspective

Kids and parents have different responses to stress but all are geared to one thought: surviving at home.

Whenever we encounter stress, there’s always something we do that makes the situation a little more bearable. These things are called “stress responses” — behaviors we learn and develop during our childhood to help reduce all the stress we encounter. They don’t always stay the same, however. Once the behavior doesn’t “soothe” us like it did before, we change it to something else. It’s why some of us resort to drinking, smoking, vaping, or doing risky things.

So how exactly does a stress response work and how do parents have a hand in it? Here’s how it goes!

The Six F’s of Stress Responses: Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn, Fine, and Faint

While we all have unique ways of coping with hardships, they usually fall under one of the six categories: fight, flight, freeze, fawn, fight, and faint. Discovered by physiologist Walter Bradford Cannon in the 1900s, the stress responses were all triggered by one feeling: the fear of dying or getting hurt. The only thing that differentiates the six from one another is the emotion they use to deal with it.

Fight

Remember the look that moms eventually gain? That’s what someone would call a fight coping mechanism; instead of fleeing, we stand our ground and fight, ready to lash out at anything or anyone for the slightest movement. Some fight responses include balling our hands into fists, trembling, tensing up, our bodies heating up, and raising voices (Maharani and Mustikasari, 2021; DiClemente and Richards, 2022).

The Fight Stress Response relies on intimidating the threat, minimizing the possible danger and hopefully scaring them off.

Flight

Flight is when we “walk out.” With our hearts pounding and the voices getting louder, we quickly turn heel and run opposite from the danger. Our minds are already telling us, “We can’t win this. Run!” Those who have this kind of response usually don’t believe they don’t have the strength to overwhelm their opponent (Chu et. al, 2024).

Flight is based on fear. However, some kids, especially those from Asian or Hispanic cultures, quickly learn that running away makes some parents angrier. That’s why there are memes about us chasing our kids with a wooden plank, hanger, belt, slipper, and other blunt objects.

Freeze

Then, some are completely overwhelmed to the point they freeze. Unable to speak, move, let alone think, people freeze because they feel that fighting back or running away will do nothing. So, they instead adjust by paralyzing themselves, knowing that anything they do could provoke the threat (Hashemi et. al, 2021; Dragt, 2024). Their heart rate drops which is not good for families with a history of heart disease or arrhythmia — irregular heartbeats.

Fawn

But the strangest one perhaps is fawning — this is when we start being “nice” or performing a certain love language to pacify or reduce the danger. In a way, they trigger feelings of pity and guilt to reduce the chances of them getting hurt. They purposely neglect their personal feelings and boundaries to avoid stress.

Among Filipino families, this is one of the usual stress responses. In fear of “rocking the boat,” everyone argues it’s the “right thing to do” and insists on catering to the irritable and emotionally unstable one to reduce the stress.

Fine

The Fine Stress Response is when we straight-up deny that we’re hurt by what happened. Sometimes, we even get defensive when people ask us about it. An irritated “I’m fine!” or “I turned out fine!” can be signs of someone having a fine stress response. Those who resort to “fine” also have a strong sense of independence; helping them and talking to them about the trauma forces them to confront their pain which they aren’t always ready for.

Teens prefer saying “Fine” because they’re looking for their independence. However, kids who grew up with parents who scolded them for crying or showing any signs of hurt can rely on the fine stress response.

Grey Rock — a method where we withhold all our emotions to remain as unengaging and uninteresting as possible — can be a possible type of fine stress response.

Faint

This stress response is when people drop and quite literally, faint. Some teens even start having seizures when stress happens before they “black out” (Tanner, von Gaudecker, Buelow, Oruche, and Miller, 2022). It’s the human version of “play dead.” The thought goes, “If I’m dead, they’ll think I’m less of a threat and leave me alone.”

Can people have two or more stress responses?

Yes, people can! Just like mental health disorders, a person can rely on two or even all six stress responses. However, they will have a favored stress response which can make it seem that they only respond one way to stress. Those who are mindful of their body’s responses can even control their stress responses or choose which one best fits the situation.

How family members can influence each other’s stress response

Any behavior, both good and bad, is first acquired in childhood.

Based on the Social Learning theory, children learn via observation which psychologist Albert Bandura proved. They watch how, we, their parents deal with stress, and with the one or two persons unable to tell them if it’s right or wrong, they just figure that it works anyway. So if kids start screaming and kicking, there’s a good chance they picked it up from us.

But power plays can also decide which stress response the child will pick up. Freud would argue that the parent the child mimics is based on which parent they “identify” most with. Or, whoever wears the pants. If the kids see mom and dad fight then, they learn who to copy.

Now, why do kids learn our stress responses when we know it’s not good? The thing is, they don’t know that. All they know is that they have to survive and the one who has answers to that problem is us. So chances are, they’ll copy the “stronger” parent to prevent themselves from being on the receiving end of their temper.

But are there chances they copy the “weaker” parent? If they are lashed out at just as often as the “weaker” parent then, there’s a bigger chance they’ll sympathize and copy their stress responses instead. There is some truth to having “strength in numbers.”

Here’s the million peso question: does culture dictate which stress response families favor?

Which stress responses do Filipino families resort to more?

Weaponizing a combination of hiya and utang na loob often creates a mentality in Filipino families that it’s better to “not rock the boat.” Especially if they know there’s something to gain in the end, some would rather stay silent. Usually, the act of maintaining the boat centers around one person. This person is usually the angriest, the loudest, and the one everyone agrees that they are the most difficult to deal with. So, they resort to either “fine” (ignoring the barbs and insults) or “fawn” (earn that figure’s favor).

As a social culture, many Filipinos still believe that it’s more of “who you know” than “what you can do.” The painful reality is that we, as parents, sometimes continue that mentality in our kids when we insist they “respect” their relatives despite the discomfort their mere presence causes.

But that stops now. After all, forcing kids to “bow” to authority (even if the said figure is factually and innately wrong) is why most kids, as they age, cut ties with their families. They’ve learned that nobody can keep them safe. Not even their parents.

References

Chu, B., Marwaha, K., Sanvictores, T., Awosika, A. O., & Ayers, D. (2024). Physiology, stress reaction. In StatPearls [Internet]. StatPearls Publishing.

DiClemente, C. M., & Richards, M. H. (2022). Community violence in early adolescence: Assessing coping strategies for reducing delinquency and aggression. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 51(2), 155-169.

Dragt, K. (2024). Physiological Mechanisms Underlying the Passive Defence Response in Human Individuals: A Systematic Review.

Hashemi, M. M., Zhang, W., Kaldewaij, R., Koch, S. B., Smit, A., Figner, B., Jonker, R., Klumpers, F. & Roelofs, K. (2021). Human defensive freezing: associations with hair cortisol and trait anxiety. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 133, 105417.

Maharani, M. S., & Mustikasari, M. (2021). Stress levels and high school adolescents coping mechanism during the Covid-19 pandemic. Jurnal Keperawatan Padjadjaran, 9(3), 240-246.

Tanner, A. L., von Gaudecker, J. R., Buelow, J. M., Oruche, U. M., & Miller, W. R. (2022). “It’s hard!”: Adolescents’ experience attending school with psychogenic nonepileptic seizures. Epilepsy & Behavior, 132, 108724.

More about Filipino family culture and psychology?

How Utang na Loob Made Filipino Families Toxic
Utak Talangka or Talangkang Pag-iisip: What is Crab Mentality?
Guilt Trip: A Common Toxic Tactic in Filipino Families