stressed

The most interesting statement in the story about spiking levels of stress in college freshmen yesterday was in the last sentence: 

And while men who challenged their professor’s ideas in class had a decline in stress, for women it was associated with a decline in well-being.

I've never really noticed this particular gender-gap, but I always encourage everyone to challenge everyone else's ideas, in my classes. Especially mine. And then to accept the challenge, think about it, respond and occasionally accede to it. That's the whole point of gathering for philosophy class, and I find it a marvelous de-stresser.

By the way: most of my students say they're working harder than their peers in that study who claimed to be reading less than 40 pages of text per week, for all their classes combined. But many agree: High School really was more stressful.