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Psychoneuroimmunology

from Psychology, health and illness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2014

By
Elizabeth Bachen ,
Sheldon Cohen  and
Anna L. Marsland
Edited by
Susan Ayers ,
Andrew Baum ,
Chris McManus ,
Stanton Newman ,
Kenneth Wallston ,
John Weinman  and
Robert West
Elizabeth Bachen
Affiliation:
Mills College
Sheldon Cohen
Affiliation:
Carnegie Mellon University
Anna L. Marsland
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Susan Ayers
Affiliation:
University of Sussex
Andrew Baum
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Chris McManus
Affiliation:
St Mary's Hospital Medical School
Stanton Newman
Affiliation:
University College and Middlesex School of Medicine
Kenneth Wallston
Affiliation:
Vanderbilt University School of Nursing
John Weinman
Affiliation:
United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas's
Robert West
Affiliation:
St George's Hospital Medical School, University of London
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Summary

Introduction

Stressful life events have been linked to a range of immune-related disorders, including autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and cancer. Some of the most compelling evidence for stress and disease associations stems from viral challenge studies, in which volunteers are exposed to a cold or influenza virus and then monitored in quarantine for the development of infection and illness. These studies find that individuals with more life stress, as measured by a higher number of recent stressful life events, higher perceived stress and more negative affect are more likely to develop colds than individuals with lower levels of stress (Cohen et al., 1991), and that stressful events lasting a month or more are better predictors of developing colds than those of a briefer duration (Cohen et al., 1998). In addition, individuals who are more sociable and have a diverse social network are less likely to develop a cold (Cohen et al., 2003; Cohen et al., 1997), possibly because such factors may be able to decrease the frequency of stressful life events or buffer deleterious effects of stress.

In addition to disease outcomes, stressful life events may also delay the healing of wounds. Recent studies have shown that long-term care givers who were caring for a severely ill family member experienced greater emotional distress and took nine days longer to heal a dermal punch biopsy wound than age- and income-matched controls (Kiecolt-Glaser et al., 1995).

Type
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Information
Cambridge Handbook of Psychology, Health and Medicine , pp. 167 - 172
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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