Source: French to English Tester Published on: 2026-04-25
Source: The Conversation – France in French (3)– By Nour Chiboub, PhD student, University Savoie Mont Blanc
Stress is part of daily life, but do we really know what it encompasses? What are the foundations of stress and how, when it becomes chronic at work, does it lead to professional burnout?
Thestresshas become an everyday word. An approaching deadline, a bad night, a conflict at work… You have certainly heard the phrase: “I am stressed.” A statement that nevertheless deserves to be questioned.
InThe Confessions(Book XI, chapter 14), Saint Augustine wrote about time: “What then is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I want to explain it to someone who asks me, I no longer know.” The same applies to stress. Are we talking about an event, an internal state, or a bodily reaction? In practice, the term often serves to designate all three dimensions at once.
This polysemic use gives the impression that everyone is talking about the same thing. However, that is not the case. This confusion shapes the way we think about stress, often in a negative way.
Stress is above all a scientific concept derived from biology and physiology, which was then extended to psychology and social sciences.
Stress: a scientific concept
The concept of stress is part of the study of biological adaptation. In the 19th century,Claude Bernardintroduced the concept of the internal environment.Walter Cannonthen formalizes the concept of homeostasis, which refers to the organism’s ability to maintain an internal balance despite environmental variations.
In this context, the endocrinologist Hans Selye proposed, in 1936, afoundational conceptualization of stress. In an article published in the scientific journalNature, he defines stress as:
“The nonspecific response of the organism to any request made to it.”
From the 1960s, this strictly biological concept expanded. The work of Mason and Levine shows that the stress response also depends on psychological factors, such asemotional meaningof a situation or stillthe unexpected and the new.
These researches pave the way fortransactional modelproposed by Lazarus and Folkman. Stress arises when an individual perceives an imbalance between the demands of a situation and the resources they have to cope with it. Thus, two people facing the same situation can feel very different levels of stress.
Why stress is essential to life
Stress is an essential adaptation mechanism. Faced with a situation perceived as threatening, the brain triggers a coordinated response often described as the“fight or flight” reaction(fight or flight).
This response quickly mobilizes thesympathetic nervous system, leading to the release of adrenaline and noradrenaline, then the activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and the secretion ofcortisol,central stress hormone in humans.
This response is far from chaotic: it relies on a temporally coordinated organisation of biological mediators, somewhat like a beautifulsymphony. When it is acute and transient, this activation can be beneficial. For example, it temporarily improves alertness, certaincognitive and physical performancesand can even strengthencertain immune responses.
So, stress isn’t too bad after all. Don’t you think?
When adaptation becomes costly: allostasis
But… if stress is useful, why do we so often talk about its negative effects on health?
To answer this question, researchers Sterling and Eyer proposed, at the end of the 1980s,concept of allostasis, which designates the ability of the organism to adjust its biological systems in order to maintain stability in the face of environmental demands.
In the 1990s, neuroscientists McEwen and Stellar expanded this theoretical framework by introducing the concept ofallostatic load, which corresponds to the progressive wear of biological systems when stress responses are activated repeatedly or for prolonged periods without sufficient recovery.
We can see this as a form of “debt” that accumulates when the body mobilizes its resources without having time to replenish them.
The world of work is a particularly favorable ground for the accumulation of this debt. In this perspective,professional burnoutor burnout is often defined as a syndrome resulting from chronicity (process by which pain becomes chronic, ed.) of a stress response in a professional environment.
This generally manifests as great emotional fatigue, a kind of distance or detachment towards one’s work and the people one works with, as well as a feeling of no longer performing one’s work satisfactorily.
Taking action against chronic stress, the example of work
Research first shows that working conditions play a central role in the onset of professional burnout.Some characteristics of work, such as excessive workload, high emotional demands, or a lack of autonomy, are associated with an increased risk of burnout. A lack of support from colleagues or management is also an important factor.
These results remind us that burnout is not an individual problem. It largely depends on the organization of work. It is above all asocietal issue. The individual should not bear sole responsibility for their own exhaustion. However, this does not mean that we are completely powerless in the face of chronic stress.
In other words, it would be reductive to attribute exhaustion solely to the individual, just as it would be to entirely absolve them of responsibility.
Some avenues for individual support
Thecognitive-behavioral therapies (TCC)constitute a scientifically validated framework to better manage stress.
It is possible to identify certain automatic thoughts that amplify the stress response and distort reality. For example, a mistake at work can sometimes be interpreted as proof of incompetence.
This conclusion turns a single event into a global judgment about oneself. Which, although economical for the brain, is a shortcut that often demeans oneself. I can then “decenter” from the situation: what would I say to a friend in the same situation?
It can also be useful to distinguish the elements over which the individual has a margin of action from those that are beyond their control. During an important presentation, for example, the preparation is under our control, whereas the audience’s reaction does not depend on us. The idea is therefore to focus one’s energy on what is controllable in order not to exhaust oneself.
Finally, social support is an important resource. Talking with close ones or colleagues can help regulate stress, provided that the initial need is clearly identified. For example, ask yourself: in this situation, do I want to be listened to or receive advice? It is important not to fear explicitly verbalizing your needs.
Learning to live better with stress
We therefore propose to take a different look at stress. Used incorrectly and indiscriminately, and sometimes demonized, it is nonetheless a central scientific concept for understanding adaptation.
Stress is not the enemy. It is an essential mechanism for life. The challenge is therefore not to eliminate it but to prevent it from becoming permanent. The goal is rather to regain a more balanced temporality, where periods of activation are accompanied by genuine moments of recovery.
We can see stress as a roommate with whom we cohabit constantly. When the rules are well established, this roommate can be a valuable ally. But when it decides to put its feet on the table, it becomes toxic.
The real issue may not be to chase away stress, but to learn to live better with it.
Nour Chiboub received funding from the Fondation de France.
Aurélie Gauchet received funding from Fondation de France for Nour Chiboub’s thesis.
–ref. “I am stressed”… but what are we talking about? The physiological mechanism of professional burnout –https://theconversation.com/i-am-stressed-but-about-what-what-are-we-talking-about-from-the-physiological-mechanism-to-professional-exhaustion-281201