Today we are going to expand our view on social influences and health. Since most of the excessive stress in groups is related to working arrangements, we are going to focus upon them a bit. To start with, we will discuss how groups are formed and led and how these factors may lead to stressful situations. We will also touch upon a few ways that organizational stress may be prevented. We will discuss social influences in more detail in upcoming features.

Let's think of a group in a way that is related to function. Groups are systems as we know from previous articles. Systems are things that input something, process that something in relation to the goals of that system and output some kind of product.

For example, a rice farm inputs raw seed, takes that seed and plants it, waters, fertilizes it and eventually harvests the processed seeds. After all that seed is processed, the final output is the brown rice that is packaged and shipped to our grocery stores, health food stores and to restaurants, etc.

The goals of the group are extremely important and excessive stress is related to the way the workers may be misaligned with those goals within that particular group. For example, the leader of the rice farm might choose to use chemical fertilizers to grow the brown rice in a way that saves money. However, the workers on the farm may be against using that type of fertilizer and would prefer using organic methods.

The misalignment here may cause excess stress if the workers decide to stay there, since their personal goals are at odds with those of the farm. Their productivity may go down due to their unhappiness at work.

Their perception of the situation has lots to due with how they react to the use of fertilizer and may be changed by how they feel about the situation. For instance, they may be more willing to compromise under strained economic conditions, and feel that the compromise may save them their jobs, and even more stress, from not being able to pay the bills.

Who they hang out with at work has such a strong influence on coworkers lives that they are called the primary group. The secondary group is the formal part of the work situation, and pertains to the ways bosses and coworkers do their jobs.

Intelligent leaders will do their best to recruit and hire workers that get along by using structured inter

views, references from other workers, and by using informal ways to get to know potential recruits before they come onboard.

Minimizing stress within secondary groups is related to setting clear and realistic goals, in a way such that leaders and workers participate in the goal setting and evaluation of those goals.

Much like a person seeks balance through exercise, rest and nutrition, proper feedback within the group helps that group become strong, balanced and more fit to survive tough times.

Nature heals at all levels; even groups.

Dr. Basso has a Ph.D. in clinical psychology and biomedical systems and is president of the Connecticut Holistic Health Association (