The American Psychological Association now reports that 80 percent of Americans say they're sometimes or always stressed
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What do heart disease, back problems, and panic attacks have in common? They're all linked to stress. It's barely 7 a.m. at the Castellano household.
"Is your sister awake," asks Shelley Juggles. "Miranda, do you want me to make you a bowl of oatmeal?"
Where Shelley Juggles has three teenaged kids, hunter the dog and a full time job. The American Psychological Association now reports that 80 percent of Americans say they're sometimes or always stressed and at Least half worry that stress may make them sick.
"Today's society we seem to have stress all around us," says Daniel Yohanna.
Doctors like U of C psychiatrist Daniel Yohanna say they're right to be worried. Stress hormones are released continuously.
"It can affect almost any organ in the body depending on the individual," says Yohanna.
So back to Shelley, who's now at work, as a property manager of a 186 unit building. First thing today, a meeting with supervisor, Regina Gubic about a building inspection and employee vacations schedules. Then we asked NBC fitness team member Andrea Metcalfe to join us, with some new technology. A voice analyzing device that literally tests for stress.
The stress indicator is software in this instance loaded into a hand held device. Her stress score, on a scale of one to ten.
Shelley's max stress, 9.1. Her stress is high , just thinking about putting that whole project together. It's called layered voice analysis. In less than a minute, manufacturers say the program identifies and analyzes thousands of voice expressions so minute the human ear can't hear them. All of which indicate how much and what kind of stress you're feeling.
Once you're aware of the stress, how do you fix it?
"Just by taking two or three minutes to come up here. To turn it off," says Shelley.
They run the tests again. And less than a minute later, her stress level is going down, and dropping with each test.
-Courtesy Nesita Kwan, NBC News
