times helps one to perform better and/or think with more clarity and precision,. However, if that person becomes excessively stressed and anxious, he or she will have difficulty remembering what to say. The physical stress of swimming in very cold water helps individuals to swim harder, but only for a short time. The colder the water and harder that one swims, the more quickly he or she becomes exhausted. Everyone’s tolerance for stress is different, and individuals handle various types of stress differently. It is important to recognize and respect one’s limits. People do not learn to handle stress by letting it overwhelm them and rob them of their strength. Ideally, people would be able to adjust to the amount of stress that they face so that they receive neither too much nor too little. This, of course, is not always possible. When one cannot eliminate excessive stress, the best way to manage it is to learn to maintain a balance even during a stressful event. If people learn to recognize the warning signs of increasing stress before they reach their limit, they can cope intelligently with their stresses before their resources are all spent. (Sarafino,1999). A large population of people suffering from high stress is college students. In a study by Whiteman (1998) stress is defined as any situation that evokes negative thoughts and feelings in a person. The same situation is not evocative or stressful for all people, and all people do not experience the same negative thoughts and feelings when stressed. A critical issue concerning stress among students is its effect on learning. Yerkes-Doson Law postulates that individuals under low and high stress learn to the least and that those under moderate stress learn the most. Field study and laboratory tests support the notion that excessive stress is harmful to students’ performance. Mechanisms that explain why students perform badly under stress incl...
