Jessica Morris

Suzanne Thomas
UWRT 1103-048
April 20th, 2016

Reflection 1 (rough draft): After writing about 4 pages of introductory information, I felt very
confident in my ability to write the full 8 pages required. I gathered a plethora of information
crucial to my topic that helps me and others understand anxiety. I am still unsure about
placement of certain paragraphs and how to flow my paper. Getting feedback from the group
meeting was very helpful. I got some strong ideas on how to elaborate on specific ideas and what
else I could add to my paper. I fear about writing too much of my personal life in a paper that is
targeting people that may not care to learn about how it affects me but more how it affects the
general population. I know I will continue to look for more evidence in the sources that I have in
order to back up my information the most that I possibly can.
Reflection 2 (final draft): Upon finishing my paper, I feel extremely proud. I was able to include
almost every source that I had originally found and in a manner that flowed in my paper. I
enjoyed being able to write about something that pertained to my life, but with that being said I
did not want to include too much about my personal life in efforts to spare my readers. I used
examples to help people understand the severity and I tried to tie it back to some relevant
situations that my audience can relate to. I think I did a good job at expressing my concerns
about why others should be educated about it and the severity in which anxiety entails. I hope
that my audience has a newfound understand and respect for people who suffer from this
disorder.

Are you nervous or anxious?

Nationwide, people are suffering from diseases and disorders that the majority of the
population has no knowledge about unless they suffer from it themselves. Even some of the most
common disorders can be some of the most misunderstood ones. To narrow the long list down, I
wanted to focus on one disorder in specific, anxiety. I chose to inquire the topic of anxiety due to
my relationship with the disorder. Having a first hand experience with a disorder like anxiety
does not mean that I understand it any more than the average person who does not suffer from it.
By choosing to learn more about anxiety, I hope to gain insight for myself on how it can affect a
person mentally, physically, psychologically, and emotionally throughout a persons life. At the
same time, I wish to relay the information to those who have the wrong idea about anxiety.
Anxiety is looked at as such a simple term. The most common definition of anxiety is, a
feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with
an uncertain outcome, and people take this out of context and change the meaning of it. Along
with it being generalized, anxiety is often thought of as just simply being nervous about
something in particular or having a panic attack about an event. The Mayo Clinic Staff gives a
helpful way to think about it, It's normal to feel anxious from time to time, especially if your
life is stressful. However, excessive, ongoing anxiety and worry that interfere with day-to-day
activities may be a sign of generalized anxiety disorder (Mayo Clinic Staff). What most people
do not understand is that there are many different types of anxiety disorders and a majority of
them cannot be controlled. Much of peoples anxiety is related to something that is either
unknown or is irrational. Like the definition states, it is the fear of the unknown that triggers
someone to get anxious.

To break it down, lets look at the types of anxiety disorders one can experience. Social
anxiety occurs when someone is in social situations or is going to be in social situations,
obsessive-compulsive disorder is the repeated thoughts or feelings of needing to do something,
generalized anxiety is constantly being anxious of the unknown, and phobias are uncontrollable
fears of a specific situation or object. Most people do not know that post-traumatic stress
disorder is also a form of anxiety where one becomes unstable and anxious at times because of a
traumatic event that has occurred to them in the past. People often do not understand that anxiety
is not just one disorder with one set list of symptoms and one set list of cures, it is much more
complex and still being studied.
Even though anxiety is one of the most common disorders that people suffer from, it is
not exceptionally easy to manage or to cure. Because of the numerous types and levels of
anxiety, there are a few different ways to treat them. The most common go to form is through
medications, which include selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, tricyclic antidepressants, and
benzodiazepines. As most people know, these medications do not necessarily help in the long
run; they just take the edge off for the time being. Therefore, medications are often coupled with
some form of therapy to help someone create coping mechanisms for the long run. Sometimes
both of these methods combined can never fully cure a person of their anxiety; it can only help
them manage it for the rest of their life. For some people simple breathing exercises, drinking
tea, or going on a run is their only way to relax. When it comes to my anxiety, I must isolate
myself and play music in order to calm myself down.
I wanted to explore what exactly causes anxiety, if it is more genetic, more
environmental, or a combination of both. There have been multiple studies completed in attempts
to pinpoint the exact reasoning a person forms anxiety. A peer review article published in the

American Journal of Medical Genetics performed experiments using lab animals to test their
genetic predispositions for anxiety and their levels of serotonin, a neurotransmitter involved in
nerve impulses. From this data it was concluded that, genes may confer susceptibility to an
anxiety proneness that cuts across clinical diagnostic labels, (Smoller). All of this meaning that
there are genetic factors that contribute, if not cause anxiety related behavior. But it is also said
that, Anxiety and fear are normal human emotions that have survival value and the distinctions
between normal and pathological degrees of anxiety can be difficult to define, (Smoller) which
backs up my point of someone being able to be anxious without having anxiety. Someone with a
genetic factor for anxiety has a gene that does not know how to fight off the feeling of fear or
anxiousness.
Even though there has been so much research trying to figure out how much of anxiety is
hereditary, much of the information falls back to outside factors. Besides genetic factors, there
are numerous environmental factors that can cause or contribute to anxiety. Some of these factors
include past experiences, school, bullying, parental influence, peers and peer pressure, drugs and
alcohol, and social settings. All of these have the ability to change the mentality and emotional
state of a person. Certain things can trigger the anxiety that can spiral a person into a panic
attack. According to Vladan Starcevic in his book, Anxiety Disorders in Adults, there are two
types of catastrophes that panic patients anticipate: one pertains to the physical consequences of
an attack and the other to psychological and social consequences,(Starcevic, 19). For example, I
experience my greatest anxiety when I become overwhelmed with schoolwork. When it is at its
extreme, I can become physically ill or have trouble breathing, which plays into the physical
consequences of panic attacks. Whether or not you are actually wired to have anxiety, one can
still experience a great deal of it for a variety of reasons. When looking at genetics and

environment together, studies have shown that, Women are 60 percent more likely to have an
anxiety disorder than men, according to the NIMH, (Pietrangelo). This statistic gives a little
insight of how popular anxiety is among the population as a whole. Because women have a
predisposition for anxiety, they also have a predisposition for other disorders that could follow
anxiety.
Little do people know every little thing that happens in your life contributes to who you
become. The mental, physical, emotional, and psychological effects that anxiety can have on a
person are often unexpected. Those who suffer from anxiety will agree when I say that it
becomes a part of your personality, how you act, and who you become as a person. The National
Institute of Mental Health quotes someones experience saying, I couldnt do anything without
rituals. They invaded every aspect of my life, (NIMH, 5). It is evident that this person could no
longer lead a normal lifestyle without their anxiety taking control. Some people go as far as
experiencing chest pains, blackouts, or intestinal problems. Another anonymous person shared
their experience, For me, a panic attack is almost a violent experience. I feel disconnected from
reality. I feel like I'm losing control in a very extreme way,(NIMH, 3). These are just a few
physical examples of how immense the effects of anxiety can be on a persons life. Studies have
shown trends of varying serious disorders that have developed from a person having anxiety.
Some of the tangent disorders include alcoholism, hypochondria, gastrointestinal issues, and
depression. The constant worry and panic can take a serious toll on your body leading to other
issues.
When it comes to talking about things that branch off of anxiety, Starcevic does a great
job in describing the relationships between generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and depression
in his book Anxiety Disorders in Adults. Starcevic says, Depression is the most frequent

complication of GAD and the most likely reason for GAD patients to seek help, (Starcevic, 108).
According the Merriam-Webster dictionary the definition of depression is, a serious medical
condition in which a person feels very sad, hopeless, and unimportant and often is
unable to live in a normal way. Because of the two disorders commonly going hand in hand,
once one seeks help for one, you get diagnosed with multiple. Symptoms for GAD and
depression overlap in that of difficulty concentrating, trouble sleeping, and constant exhaustion.
Typically once someone is diagnosed with disorders such as depression or anxiety, they begin to
think they are less worthy and become secluded and lack confidence. This is where the emotional
and psychological effects of anxiety are exhibited because they lead to other unstable disorders
in the body that often have the same symptoms.
There is research expressed in a peer review article published in the International
Journal of Behavioral Development that explores the effects anxiety can have on someones
memory in the long term and short term. The efficiency and effectiveness of the memory was
also looked into when completing the research. It was said that, Several implications regarding
the impact of anxiety on memory storage and updating in very young children emerge from these
findings, (Visu-Petra, 6). Being able to state that there were evident implications in a childs
memory of which the child experiences some form of anxiety concludes that their research was
not only correct but helpful in explaining the learning issues that students may be experiencing.
There was also research stating that, According to ACT, anxious individuals should show
impaired performance in dual-task situations in which the concurrent demands of the two tasks
on the central executive are high,(Derakshan & Eysenck). This is especially relevant to myself
and the audience I am targeting due to the fact that most everyone has taken the SAT or the ACT
within the last few years and they understand the stress it puts on a person. Anxiety has a larger

effect on the brains power to remember and recite something back and the ability to complete
tedious tasks than most people may think.
With all of the side effects a person can encounter and the disorders that one can develop
alongside of anxiety, it is hard for people to accomplish strenuous activities to the ability that
others can. For example as talked about earlier, standardized testing such as the SAT and ACT
could be a significantly harder task when suffering from anxiety. Something like doing a
presentation in front of a class could cause major panic attacks or physical side effects. As one
grows older and is in their career, having deadlines or large meetings could potentially result in
severe anxiety. With all of that being said, I do not think that the rest of the population has
thought about accommodating those with anxiety. One of my major goals in choosing this
inquiry topic was to help my readers understand how much greater of an issue anxiety is than is
commonly thought. If people can understand the depth of it, they might be more open to
changing the ways that some things are run or handled. For instance, allowing a child to present
their project to just their teacher, allowing a longer span of time for taking a test, or allowing
someone to video conference into a meeting instead of physically being there. Having these
simple exceptions could make the world of a difference to someone.
Overall, I want people to understand a topic that is so common and relevant in our society
yet so hidden in the dark. It is important that the population as a whole understand anxiety
because even if it does not directly affect them, it can and will more than likely indirectly affect
them. Knowledge of anxiety has grown immensely through research and is continuing to grow as
we speak. The biggest ideas are that anxiety is much more complex than the simple concept of
being nervous, the side effects are much more severe than most realize, and suffering from
anxiety can lead to many other health complications. Through this paper I feel that I established a

strong understanding of the topic and expressed the ideas about anxiety that I felt were most
crucial. Much of what comes with this topic is most easily understood to those with anxiety, but I
wanted others to get a feel for what anxiety really entails.

Citations
Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Mayo Clinic Staff. Mayo Clinic. Mayo Foundation for Medical
Education and Research, 25 Sept 2014. Web. 28 Mar. 2016. <www.mayoclinic.org>
NIMH. (2009). Anxiety Disorders. Retrieved March 20, 2016,
fromhttp://permanent.access.gpo.gov/lps125970/nimganxiety.pdf
Smoller JW, Faraone SV. 2008. Genetics of anxiety disorders: Complexities and opportunities.
Am J Med Genet Part C Semin Med Genet 148C:8588
Visu- Petra, Laura, Lavinia Cheie, Oana Benga, and Tracey Packiam Alloway. Effects of
Anxiety on Memory Storage and Updating in Young Children. International Journal of
Behavioral Development 47th ser. 35.38 (2011). Sage Journals. Web. 30 Mar. 2016.
Vladan Starcevic. Anxiety Disorders in Adults. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2005. Print. A Clinical
Guide.