scholarly journals Sex Differences in Endocrine and Psychological Responses to Psychosocial Stress in Healthy Elderly Subjects and the Impact of a 2-Week Dehydroepiandrosterone Treatment1

1998 ◽  
Vol 83 (5) ◽  
pp. 1756-1761 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brigitte M. Kudielka ◽  
Juliane Hellhammer ◽  
Dirk H. Hellhammer ◽  
Oliver T. Wolf ◽  
Karl-Martin Pirke ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sex Differences ◽  
Stress Responses ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Elderly Subjects ◽  
Healthy Elderly ◽  
Free Cortisol ◽  
The Impact

Evidence from animal as well as human studies has suggested that significant sex differences exist in hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA) activity. As gonadal steroids could be important modulators of HPA sex differences, stress responses were investigated in subjects of advanced age after dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) or placebo treatment. After a 2-week treatment with 50 mg DHEA daily or placebo, 75 men and women (mean age, 67.6 yr) were exposed to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). The TSST is a brief psychosocial stress that consists of a free speech and mental arithmetic task in front of an audience. The results show that the TSST induced significant increases in ACTH, salivary free cortisol, total plasma cortisol, norepinephrine, and heart rates (all P < 0.0001) as well as decreased positive affect in the elderly (P = 0.0009). Men showed larger stress responses in ACTH (P = 0.004), salivary free cortisol (P = 0.044), and plasma total cortisol (P = 0.076) compared to women. No sex differences were observed in norepinephrine, epinephrine, or heart rate responses. In contrast to ACTH and cortisol response differences, women reported that they were significantly more stressed by the TSST than men (P = 0.0051). Women treated with DHEA showed ACTH stress responses similar to those of men, but significantly enhanced compared to those of women taking placebos (P < 0.009). No other stress response differences emerged between DHEA and placebo groups. Finally, DHEA treatment did not result in an improvement of subjective well-being. We conclude that elderly men show larger HPA responses than women to psychosocial stress, as studied in the TSST. Estrogen effects on hypothalamic CRF-producing neurons might be responsible for these sex differences.

Effects of d-amphetamine upon psychosocial stress responses

2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (7) ◽  
pp. 608-615 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Childs ◽  
Anya K Bershad ◽  
Harriet de Wit
Keyword(s):  
Stress Responses ◽  
Self Efficacy ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Social Stress ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Cognitive Appraisals ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Laboratory Animals ◽  
Double Blind

Psychostimulant drugs alter the salience of stimuli in both laboratory animals and humans. In animals, stimulants increase rates of responding to conditioned incentive stimuli, and in humans, amphetamine increases positive ratings of emotional images. However, the effects of stimulants on real-life emotional events have not been studied in humans. In this study, we examined the effect of d-amphetamine on responses to acute psychosocial stress using a public speaking task. Healthy volunteers ( N=56) participated in two experimental sessions, one with a psychosocial stressor (the Trier Social Stress Test) and one with a non-stressful control task. They were randomly assigned to receive d-amphetamine (5 mg n=18, 10 mg n=20) or placebo ( n=18) on both sessions under double blind conditions. Salivary cortisol, subjective mood, and vital signs were measured at regular intervals during the session. Subjects also provided cognitive appraisals of the tasks before and after their performances. Amphetamine produced its expected mood and physiological effects, and the Trier Social Stress Test produced its expected effects on cortisol and mood. Although neither dose of amphetamine altered cardiovascular or hormonal responses to stress, amphetamine (10 mg) increased participants’ pre-task appraisals of how challenging the task would be, and it increased post-task ratings of self-efficacy. Paradoxically, it also increased ratings of how stressful the task was, and prolonged aversive emotional responses. These findings suggest that amphetamine differentially affects stress response components: it may increase participants’ appraisals of self-efficacy without dampening the direct emotional or physiological responses to the stress.

scholarly journals Acute Psychosocial Stress Modulates the Detection Sensitivity for Facial Emotions

2020 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 140-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernadette von Dawans ◽  
Ines Spenthof ◽  
Patrick Zimmer ◽  
Gregor Domes
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Social Perception ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Social Stress ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Detection Sensitivity ◽  
Alpha Amylase ◽  
Facial Emotions ◽  
Free Cortisol

Abstract. Psychosocial stress has been shown to alter social perception and behavior. In the present study, we investigated whether a standardized psychosocial stressor modulates the perceptual sensitivity for positive and negative facial emotions and the tendency to allocate attention to facial expressions. Fifty-four male participants underwent the Trier Social Stress Test for Groups (TSST-G) or a nonstressful control condition before they performed a facial emotions detection task and a facial dot-probe task to assess attention for positive and negative facial expressions. Saliva samples were collected over the course of the experiment to measure free cortisol and alpha amylase. In response to the TSST-G, participants showed marked increases in subjective stress, salivary cortisol, and alpha amylase compared to the control condition. In the control condition, detection performance was higher for angry compared to happy facial expressions, while in the stressful condition this difference was reversed. Here, participants were more sensitive to happy compared to angry facial expressions. Attention was unaffected by psychosocial stress. The results suggest that psychosocial stress shifts social perception in terms of detection sensitivity for facial expressions toward positive social cues, a pattern that is consistent with the tendency to seek social support for coping with stress.

Inflexibly Focused under Stress: Acute Psychosocial Stress Increases Shielding of Action Goals at the Expense of Reduced Cognitive Flexibility with Increasing Time Lag to the Stressor

2011 ◽  
Vol 23 (11) ◽  
pp. 3218-3227 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franziska Plessow ◽  
Rico Fischer ◽  
Clemens Kirschbaum ◽  
Thomas Goschke
Keyword(s):  
Stress Response ◽  
Cognitive Control ◽  
Cognitive Flexibility ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Amylase Activity ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Free Cortisol ◽  
Cortisol Levels ◽  
Acute Psychosocial Stress

Dynamically adjusting the right amount of goal shielding to varying situational demands is associated with the flexibility of cognitive control, typically linked with pFC functioning. Although stress hormones are found to also bind to prefrontal receptors, the link between stress and cognitive control remains elusive. Based on that, we aimed at investigating effects of acute psychosocial stress on dynamic control adjustments. Forty-eight healthy volunteers were exposed to either a well-established stress induction protocol (the Trier Social Stress Test, TSST) or a standardized control situation before a selective attention (Simon) task involving response conflicts. The individual physiological stress response was monitored by analyzing levels of free cortisol and α-amylase activity in saliva samples showing that the TSST reliably induced an increase of endogenous stress hormone levels. Acute stress did not inevitably impair cognitive functioning, however, as stressed participants showed tonically increased goal shielding (to reduce interference) at the expense of decreased cognitive flexibility. Importantly, as a novel finding in humans, stress effects on cognitive functions were not present immediately after the stress experience but developed gradually over time and, therefore, paralleled the time course of the hypothalamus–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) stress response. In addition, the total increase of individual cortisol levels reflecting HPA activity, but not the total changes in α-amylase activity associated with sympathetic activity, was reversely related to the amount of cognitive flexibility in the final block of testing. Our study provides evidence for a stress-induced time-dependent decrease of cognitive flexibility that might be related to changes in cortisol levels.

scholarly journals Smart aging monitoring and early dementia recognition (SAMEDR): uncovering the hidden wellness parameter for preventive well-being monitoring to categorize cognitive impairment and dementia in community-dwelling elderly subjects through AI

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hemant Ghayvat ◽  
Prosanta Gope
Keyword(s):  
Healthy Subject ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Data Models ◽  
Community Dwelling ◽  
Sensor Data ◽  
Elderly Subjects ◽  
Healthy Elderly ◽  
Early Dementia ◽  
The Impact

AbstractReasoning weakening because of dementia degrades the performance in activities of daily living (ADL). Present research work distinguishes care needs, dangers and monitors the effect of dementia on an individual. This research contrasts in ADL design execution between dementia-affected people and other healthy elderly with heterogeneous sensors. More than 300,000 sensors associated activation data were collected from the dementia patients and healthy controls with wellness sensors networks. Generated ADLs were envisioned and understood through the activity maps, diversity and other wellness parameters to categorize wellness healthy, and dementia affected the elderly. Diversity was significant between diseased and healthy subjects. Heterogeneous unobtrusive sensor data evaluate behavioral patterns associated with ADL, helpful to reveal the impact of cognitive degradation, to measure ADL variation throughout dementia. The primary focus of activity recognition in the current research is to transfer dementia subject occupied homes models to generalized age-matched healthy subject data models to utilize new services, label classified datasets and produce limited datasets due to less training. Current research proposes a novel Smart Aging Monitoring and Early Dementia Recognition system that provides the exchange of data models between dementia subject occupied homes (DSOH) to healthy subject occupied homes (HSOH) in a move to resolve the deficiency of training data. At that point, the key attributes are mapped onto each other utilizing a sensor data fusion that assures to retain the diversities between various HSOH & DSOH by diminishing the divergence between them. Moreover, additional tests have been conducted to quantify the excellence of the offered framework: primary, in contradiction of the precision of feature mapping techniques; next, computing the merit of categorizing data at DSOH; and, the last, the aptitude of the projected structure to function thriving due to noise data. The outcomes show encouraging pointers and highlight the boundaries of the projected approach.

The Impact of Stress on Odor Perception

Perception ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 366-376 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthias Hoenen ◽  
Oliver T. Wolf ◽  
Bettina M. Pause
Keyword(s):  
Stress Responses ◽  
Social Stress ◽  
Physiological Stress ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Odor Identification ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
University Of Pennsylvania ◽  
Control Session ◽  
Identification Performance ◽  
The Impact

The olfactory system and emotional systems are highly intervened and share common neuronal structures. The current study investigates whether emotional (e.g., anger and fear) and physiological (saliva cortisol) stress responses are associated with odor identification ability and hedonic odor judgments (intensity, pleasantness, and unpleasantness). Nineteen men participated in the modified Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) and a control session (cycling on a stationary bike). The physiological arousal was similar in both sessions. In each session, participants’ odor identification score was assessed using the University of Pennsylvania Smell Identification Test, and their transient mood was recorded on the dimensions of valence, arousal, anger, and anxiety. Multivariate regression analyses show that an increase of cortisol in the TSST session (as compared with the control session) is associated with better odor identification performance (β = .491) and higher odor intensity ratings (β = .562). However, increased anger in the TSST session (as compared with the control session) is associated with lower odor identification performance (β = −.482). The study shows divergent effects of the emotional and the physiological stress responses, indicating that an increase of cortisol is associated with better odor identification performance, whereas increased anger is associated with poorer odor identification performance.

scholarly journals IL-6 Response to Psychosocial Stress Predicts 12-month Changes in Cardiometabolic Biomarkers in Perimenopausal Women

2020 ◽  
Vol 105 (10) ◽  
pp. e3757-e3765
Author(s):  
Anthony S Zannas ◽  
Jennifer L Gordon ◽  
Alan L Hinderliter ◽  
Susan S Girdler ◽  
David R Rubinow
Keyword(s):  
Insulin Resistance ◽  
Interleukin 6 ◽  
Vascular Function ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Disease Risk ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
The United States ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Model Assessment ◽  
Perimenopausal Women

Abstract Objective Cardiometabolic diseases are the number one cause of mortality, accounting for over one third of all deaths in the United States. Cardiometabolic risk further increases with psychosocial stress exposure and during menopausal transition in women. Because disease risk and stress burden are associated with aberrant immune signaling, we hypothesized that responses of interleukin-6 (IL-6) to psychosocial stress may predict longitudinal cardiometabolic outcomes in perimenopausal women. Methods We conducted post hoc analyses in 151 perimenopausal or early postmenopausal women participants in a previously completed study. At study onset, participants underwent the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST), and plasma IL-6 was measured repeatedly before and during the 1 hour post-TSST. Subsequently, participants were randomly assigned to either hormonal treatment (HT) or placebo and followed for 12 months to determine longitudinal changes in cardiometabolic biomarkers. Results Greater IL-6 reactivity to stress, measured with baseline-adjusted area under the curve, predicted 12-month decrease in flow-mediated dilatation of the brachial artery (P = 0.0005), a measure of endothelial-dependent vascular function, but not in endothelial-independent function measured with nitroglycerin-mediated dilatation (P = 0.17). Greater baseline IL-6 levels predicted 12-month increase in insulin resistance based on the homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance score (P = 0.0045) and in the number of criteria met for metabolic syndrome (P = 0.0008). These predictions were not moderated by HT. Conclusions Greater baseline IL-6 levels as well as its reactivity to stress may predict worsening in distinct cardiometabolic biomarkers as women transition to menopause. Interleukin-6 reactivity predicts decline in endothelial-dependent vascular function, whereas baseline IL-6 presages accumulation of metabolic risk.

scholarly journals The Nature of Reality: Human Stress Recovery during Exposure to Biodiverse, Multisensory Virtual Environments

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morgan Faith Schebella ◽  
Delene Weber ◽  
Lisa Schultz ◽  
Philip Weinstein
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Environments ◽  
Social Stress ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Trier Social Stress Test ◽  
Stress Recovery ◽  
Natural Environments ◽  
Olfactory Stimuli ◽  
Human Stress

Immersive virtual environments (IVEs) were used to test the effects of biodiversity on recovery from induced stress. Three natural environments and one urban environment were used to represent ordinal levels of biodiversity (none, low, moderate, and high). The four IVEs comprised visual, auditory, and olfactory stimuli. An additional high biodiversity IVE without auditory or olfactory stimuli was also included to study the effects of multisensory stimulation per se on recovery from stress and perceptions of biodiversity. Following stress induction via a novel IVE Trier Social Stress Test (TSST-IVE), heart rate and five self-reported well-being measures were used to assess participants’ recovery after immersion in one of the five IVEs. The results showed consistent well-being responses across both self-reported and physiological measures, suggesting biodiversity does directly affect human well-being. However, the relationship was not linear. For most measures of well-being, stress recovery was least effective in the urban IVE, consistent with past research. The low biodiversity IVE elicited the greatest improvement in all well-being measures except self-reported calmness. One could speculate that the landscape features of the least biodiverse IVE may elicit subconscious preferences toward savanna-like landscapes, as suggested by previous studies. The IVE depicting a moderate level of biodiversity was the least restorative of the natural environments. A multisensory experience was associated with better recovery in all measures of well-being than a visual-only experience, and perceptions of landscape components significantly differed between two identical nature scenes when auditory and olfactory stimuli were removed. Nuances in the data and implications of the findings are discussed. The results signal a need for caution and question the assumption that cultural ecosystem services align with positive outcomes for biodiversity conservation.

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