Recent Perceived Stress.

The Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) is a psychometrically validated self-report questionnaire that assesses the perceived stress level and the degree to which people find their lives to be unpredictable, uncontrollable, or overcharged during the past month (Cohen et al., 1983). Further, the Life Stress Questionnaire (LSQ; see Appendix A) was utilized to assess both the number of stressors over the past month and the perceived stress of each. The LSQ is a self-report measure developed in our laboratory that assesses 47 common stressors and two free response stressors during the past month, developed from pre-existing measures of life stress such as the Stressful Life Events Screening Questionnaire (SLESQ) (Goodman et al., 1998) and the Life Events Checklist (LEC) (Gray et al., 2004). Stressors include those related to school, work, family, relationships, health, and finances, and two optional free response items. Each stressor experienced over the past month is assessed with a 5-point Likert scale for self-rated severity of the stress. A weighted total score is calculated by multiplying the occurrence of each stressor by the self-reported stress level, then summing these values.