Extreme stress in childhood is toxic to your DNA

TheConversation: The real danger of separating children from parents is not the psychological stress – it’s the biological time bomb. The screaming and crying, the anguish and desolation is gut-wrenching. But the fallout pales in comparison to the less visible long-term effects that are more sinister and dangerous. Separating children from their parents, in a strange land, among strangers, causes the most extreme life stress a child can experience. And it causes profound and irreversible changes in how their DNA is packaged and which genes are turned on and off in the cells of the body, in organs like the pancreas, the lungs, heart and brain – leading to lifelong changes in its structure and function.

Having Stress-Related Disorder Associated With Increased Risk of Developing Autoimmune Disease

JAMA: Stress-related disorders brought on by traumatic or stressful life events were associated with increased risk of developing an autoimmune disease.
Why The Research Is Interesting: Development of stress-related disorders such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may influence multiple bodily systems, including immune function. Whether this contributes to risk for autoimmune disease remains unclear.

Social Stress Leads To Changes In Gut Bacteria, Study Finds

Georgia: Exposure to psychological stress in the form of social conflict alters gut bacteria in Syrian hamsters, according to a new study by Georgia State University. It has long been said that humans have “gut feelings” about things, but how the gut might communicate those “feelings” to the brain was not known. It has been shown that gut microbiota, the complex community of microorganisms that live in the digestive tracts of humans and other animals, can send signals to the brain and vice versa.

Animal Study Suggests Alcohol Use Before Pregnancy May Increase Vulnerability of Offspring to Stress in Adulthood

NIAAA: The effects of alcohol use during pregnancy on an unborn child are well known. However, a recent NIAAA-funded study in rats has shown that a mother’s alcohol use before conception also could have negative effects on her child’s health and response to stress during adulthood. To study the effects of preconception alcohol use, the research team, led by Dipak Sarkar, Ph.D., at Rutgers University, gave female rats 4 weeks of access to a diet containing 6.7 percent alcohol, which raised their blood alcohol levels similar to that of binge drinking in humans.

“Late-life” genes activated by biological clock to help protect against stress, aging

Oregon: Researchers at Oregon State University have discovered that a subset of genes involved in daily circadian rhythms, or the “biological clock,” only become active late in life or during periods of intense stress when they are most needed to help protect critical life functions. The findings, made in research done with fruit flies and published today in Nature Communications, are part of a unique stress response mechanism that was previously unknown.

Study shows discrimination interacts with genetics and affects health

Univeristy of Florida: It’s no secret that discrimination is stressful for those who experience it, but turns out the issue is more than skin deep—these stressors can interact with our genetics to negatively impact our health, a new University of Florida study shows. Study researchers developed a novel measure of unfair treatment to study the effects of discrimination on health, particularly with respect to racial disparities in complex diseases, which are illnesses resulting from both genetic and environmental factors. They used the measure to investigate hypertension, which is more prevalent in African-Americans, and found that discrimination interacts with certain genetic variants to alter blood pressure.

For men with prostate cancer, emotional distress may lead to more aggressive treatment

Buffalo: The anxiety many men experience after being diagnosed with prostate cancer may lead them to choose potentially unnecessary treatment options, researchers from the University at Buffalo and Roswell Park Cancer Institute report in a new study. “Emotional distress may motivate men with low-risk prostate cancer to choose more aggressive treatment, such as choosing surgery over active surveillance,” said UB’s Heather Orom, the lead author on the study, published in the February issue of the Journal of Urology.
“It underscores what we have been pushing a long time for, which is, ‘Let’s make this decision as informed and supported as possible.’ If distress early on is influencing treatment choice, then maybe we help men by providing clearer information about prognosis and strategies for dealing with anxiety. We hope this will help improve the treatment decision making process and ultimately, the patient’s quality of life,” added Orom, PhD, associate professor of community health and health behavior in UB’s School of Public Health and Health Professions.

Stress-associated brain activity connected to cardiovascular risk

Harvard: A study led by investigators at Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai has linked, for the first time in humans, activity in a stress-sensitive structure within the brain to the risk of subsequent cardiovascular disease. The team’s findings, published in The Lancet, also reveal a pathway leading from activation of that structure—the amygdala—through elevated immune system activity to an increased incidence of cardiovascular events.

What is exposure therapy and how can it treat social anxiety?

TheConversation: Most of us experience a level of social anxiety at some point in our lives. We worry about what people think of us, about being excluded, about being judged or humiliated. Social anxiety is characterised by an excessive fear of negative evaluation or judgement, triggered by social or performance situations. For social anxiety to be considered a disorder, the person must also be distressed by their social concerns or report a disruption in their life. They may find it difficult to interact with work colleagues, to make friends, or even to have brief conversations with others.
Excessive social anxiety makes us feel lonely and reduces our quality of life. Social anxiety disorder is the most common anxiety disorder and begins as early as 11 years of age.

A glass half empty could be a glass half full of heart disease

Scimex: Pessimism seems to be a strong risk factor for death from coronary heart disease (CHD), while optimism does not protect from it, according to a study published in the open access journal BMC Public Health that involved 2,267 middle aged and older Finnish men and women. Researchers at the Department of Psychiatry, Päijät-Häme Central Hospital, Finland, found that people with high levels of pessimism seemed to have a higher risk of CHD-induced mortality, even after adjusting for known physiological risk factors. Optimism did not seem to have any effect on that risk.

Repeatedly thinking about work-family conflict linked to health problems

Oregon: Thinking over and over again about conflicts between your job and personal life is likely to damage both your mental and physical health, research from Oregon State University suggests.
The study included more than 200 people, with results showing that “repetitive thought” was a pathway between work-family conflict and negative outcomes in six different health categories.
As the term suggests, repetitive thought regarding work-family conflict refers to thinking repeatedly and attentively about the parts of your job and your personal life that clash with each other: for example, that late-afternoon meeting that prevents you from attending your son’s baseball game. It’s a maladaptive coping strategy that impedes daily recovery from stress.

Being fit Protects Against Health Risks Caused by Stress at Work

Basel: It is a well-known fact that fitness and well-being go hand in hand. But being in good shape also protects against the health problems that arise when we feel particularly stressed at work. As reported by sports scientists from the University of Basel and colleagues from Sweden, it therefore pays to stay physically active, especially during periods of high stress. Psychosocial stress is one of the key factors leading to illness-related absences from work. This type of stress is accompanied by impaired mental well-being and an increase in depressive symptoms. It also raises the likelihood of cardiovascular risk factors such as high blood pressure and an unfavorable blood lipid profile. Conversely, a high fitness level is associated with fewer depressive symptoms and fewer cardiovascular risk factors.

‘Worried well’ may be boosting their risk of heart disease

BMJ: Potential consequences of health anxiety underlines need to  treat it, say researchers People who needlessly worry that they have, or will develop, serious illness - popularly referred to as ‘the worried well’- may  be boosting their risk of developing heart disease, suggests  research published in the online journal BMJ Open. Anxiety is a known risk factor for heart disease. And health  anxiety, which describes persistent preoccupation with havin g or  acquiring a serious illness, and seeking prompt medical advice, on the basis of misattributed bodily symptoms in the absence of  any physical disease, seems to be no exception, say the  researchers. And as such, it needs to be taken seriously and treated properly,  they suggest.

Worried but well, may boost chance of a sick heart

Scimex: People who worry about having or developing a serious illness may be raising their risk of developing heart disease, according to a team of Norwegian scientists. The researchers surveyed over 7,000 older people's levels of anxiety about their health and found that those who had health anxiety were twice as likely develop heart disease as those who didn't have health anxiety - 6 per cent compared to 3 per cent. Although this study can't prove that health anxiety causes heart disease, the authors say that there is still a need for the proper diagnosis and treatment of health anxiety.

Older adults gain weight when spouse is stressed out

Ann Arbor: Stress isn't good for your waist line. For older married couples, the added pounds may be caused by a spouse's long-term stress levels. A new University of Michigan study looked at how the negative quality of marriage can be detrimental for weight gain—possibly leading to obesity—when couples 50 and older are stressed. The results varied by gender.

Watching "so cute" cats online videos lowers stress and makes you happy

TheConversation: Watching cute cat videos and looking at their online pictures may not be a waste of time. A new study has found doing so could boost energy levels and increase feelings of happiness. Published in the journal Computers in Human Behavior the study even suggests that watching internet cats could be used as a form of digital pet therapy or stress relief. Internet data shows two million cat videos were posted on YouTube as of 2014, totalling nearly 26 billion views. Celebrity cats – such as Grumpy Cat and and Lil BUB – have also sprung up on social media, garnering mass followings.

Longevity Hormone is Lower in Stressed and Depressed Women

UCSF: Women under chronic stress have significantly lower levels of klotho, a hormone that regulates aging and enhances cognition, researchers at UC San Francisco have found in a study comparing mothers of children on the autism spectrum to low-stress controls. The researchers found that the women in their study with clinically significant depressive symptoms had even lower levels of klotho in their blood than those who were under stress but not experiencing such symptoms.

Eating leads to stress hormone response in men with high body fat

Deakin: Dr Anne Turner from Deakin University says that it is the perfect time for men who are carrying a few extra kilos to make some positive changes. A recent study published in BMC Obesity found that men who had a higher level of body fat actually had a higher stress hormone response in their body after eating a standardised lunch, compared to lean men. "We found that men who were even moderately overweight or obese had a higher cortisol or stress hormone response to eating the lunch than lean men.

How coffee a day keeps stressheads' moods away

PNAS: Scientists have figured out how caffeine could prevent chronically stressed individuals from developing stress-related mood and memory disorders, such as depression. The international team of researchers looked at mice brains and found that caffeine physically blocks a stress-related chemical from connecting with its targets and triggering brain-changing events. Researchers report a potential molecular explanation for how chronic stress induces mood disorders and suggest a possible therapeutic approach for stress-induced disorders.

Misunderstood mothers-to-be internalise stress

Queensland: The role that stigma around mental health plays in the stress of a pregnancy – and birth complications - has been thrust into the spotlight by a study from researchers at The University of Queensland. Among the key findings was a need for psychological assessment to place greater importance on the environment surrounding the mother-to-be, rather than focusing solely on her own coping mechanisms. “In our research the women who felt misunderstood by their partners, alone, and lacking support and resources chose to silence their true voices,” Ms Staneva said.