ABSTRACT
The concept of stress as developed over the past 50 years has been framed within the context of a reductionistic-mechanistic view of adaptation. The chapters in this volume are testimony to both the productivity of this view and the need to examine the effects of stress and the mechanisms of coping from an alternative holistic perspective. It is clear from the work reviewed in this book that the effects of stress are not limited to one aspect of organismic functioning but that physiologic, psychologic, and social factors play a role in the way organisms respond to stress.
