Category: Emotion

The effect being around stressed people has on the brain.

Contact with people who are stressed changes the brain in the same way as direct contact with the stress, research finds.

The study may help to explain why family members of those with post-traumatic stress disorder sometimes show the same symptoms as those who have experienced the stress directly.

Dr Toni-Lee Sterley, who led the study, said:

“There has been other literature that shows stress can be transferred — and our study is actually showing the brain is changed by that transferred stress.

The neurons that control the brain’s response to stress showed changes in unstressed partners that were identical to those we measured in the stressed mice.”

The conclusion comes from a study on pairs of male and female mice.

One of the pair was exposed to a mild stress before being returned to its partner.

The results showed that both the stressed mouse and the one that was not directly stressed had the same changes in critical brain networks.

Professor Jaideep Bains, who led the research, said:

“What we can begin to think about is whether other people’s experiences or stresses may be changing us in a way that we don’t fully understand.

The study also demonstrates that traits we think of as uniquely human are evolutionary conserved biological traits.”

Stress caused the mice to release a chemical signal in the form of a pheromone to alert its partner.

Social interactions helped the female mice bounce back from the stress: the affected neurons recovered by around 50%.

The social interaction did not not help the male mice.

Professor Bains said:

“If some of the effects of stress are erased through social interactions, but this benefit is limited to females, this may provide insights into how we design personalized approaches for the treatment of stress disorders in people.”

The study was published in the journal Neuroscience (Sterley et al., 2018).

Difficulties dealing with stress are linked to mental health problems.

Smelling your partner’s clothes helps to reduce stress levels, research finds.

Women who smelled their partner’s t-shirt felt calmer afterwards.

In comparison, those who smelled a stranger’s t-shirt experienced increases in the stress hormone, cortisol.

Women may be particularly susceptible to the effect as their sense of smell is stronger than men.

Ms Marlise Hofer, the study’s lead author, said:

“Many people wear their partner’s shirt or sleep on their partner’s side of the bed when their partner is away, but may not realize why they engage in these behaviours.

Our findings suggest that a partner’s scent alone, even without their physical presence, can be a powerful tool to help reduce stress.”

96 opposite-sex couples were included in the study.

The women were subjected to a mock interview and math test to make them stressed.

Afterwards, they smelled t-shirts that were either unworn, smelled of their partner, or of a stranger.

Saliva tests showed that cortisol was lower when women smelled their partner’s t-shirt.

The stress-reducing effect was even stronger if the women successfully recognised the t-shirt as belonging to their partner.

Ms Hofer said:

“From a young age, humans fear strangers, especially strange males, so it is possible that a strange male scent triggers the ‘fight or flight’ response that leads to elevated cortisol.

This could happen without us being fully aware of it.”

Dr Frances Chen, study co-author, said:

“With globalization, people are increasingly traveling for work and moving to new cities.

Our research suggests that something as simple as taking an article of clothing that was worn by your loved one could help lower stress levels when you’re far from home.”

The study was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Hofer et al., 2018).