title: Stress in rural Canada: a structured review of context, stress levels, and sources of stress.
abstract: We conducted this review to organize studies on stressors, stress, and health of rural Canadians. An organizing framework of the pathway from psychosocial stressors (i.e., determinants of health) through perceived stress and physiological impacts to health outcomes was used (1) to situate the rural experience of stress within the individual using the existing reports on community and societal stressors and (2) to synthesize existing research on individual stress for rural residents. The emergent themes from the review indicated that stressors can be grouped as individual factors, relationship characteristics, health, work and education, community, finances, and the environment. We conclude by proposing that research measuring stressors of rural Canadians needs to be undertaken in order to understand the connections between health and stress for this population.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Research in Family Health, IWK Health Centre, Departments of Health, Human Performance and Psychology, Dalhousie University, NS, Canada B3K 6R8. cyndi.brannen@iwk.nshealth.ca
authors.forename: Cyndi
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Brannen
authors.forename: Debbie
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Johnson Emberly
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: McGrath
mesh_terms: D002170:Canada; D006801:Humans; D012424:Rural Population; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000209:etiology* / Q000503:physiopathology