Episode description

Welcome back to the Stress Puzzle! For our second episode, I was joined by Dr. George Slavich who is an expert on the conceptualization, assessment, and management of life stress. In this conversation, we talked about the history of how stress has been thought of and measured, the limitations of many of these approaches, and the kind of research we need moving forward to really be able to translate the science to be actionable in people's lives. 

Dr. George Slavich is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA where he is the Founding Director of the Laboratory for Stress Assessment and Research. He is an expert with enthusiasm for bettering the conceptualization, assessment, and management of life stress and for identifying psychological and biological mechanisms that link stress to mental and physical health. He has received numerous awards for his research, mentorship, and teaching, and he brings this experience and passion for precision stress science to his role as an Associate Director of the Stress Measurement Network. Learn more about his research: https://www.uclastresslab.org/

Topics Discussed:

• History of Stress Science
• Stress Conceptualization Across Time
• Notable Figures in Stress Science
• Challenges in Measuring Stress
• Theories of Life Stress
• Stressnology
• Muti-omics

Research Mentioned:

Charles Darwin:

• Darwin CR. (1859). On the origin of species. London: John Murray

Sir Clifford Allbutt:

• Allbutt C. (1895). Nervous diseases and modern life. Contemp. Rev. 67:210–217.

Walter Bradford Cannon:

• Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage: An Account of Recent Researches into the Function of Emotional Excitement (1915)
• Cannon WB. (1929). Organization for physiological homeostasis. Physiol. Rev. 9:399–431.
• The Wisdom of the Body (1932)

Hans Selye:

• Selye, H. (1936). A Syndrome produced by Diverse Nocuous Agents. Nature, 138(3479), 32–32. https://doi.org/10.1038/138032a0
• Selye, H. (1973). The Evolution of the Stress Concept: The originator of the concept traces its development from the discovery in 1936 of the alarm reaction to modern therapeutic applications of syntoxic and catatoxic hormones. American Scientist, 61(6), 692–699. 

George Slavich:

• Slavich, G. M. (2019). Stressnology: The primitive (and problematic) study of life stress exposure and pressing need for better measurement. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, 75, 3-5. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_BBI_2019.pdf
• Slavich, G. M., & Shields, G. S. (2018). Assessing lifetime stress exposure using the Stress and Adversity Inventory for Adults (Adult STRAIN): An overview and initial validation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 80, 17-27. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_PsychosomaticMedicine_2018.pdf
• Slavich, G. M., Stewart, J. G., Esposito, E. C., Shields, G. S., & Auerbach, R. P. (2019). The Stress and Adversity Inventory for Adolescents (Adolescent STRAIN): associations with mental and physical health, risky behaviors, and psychiatric diagnoses in youth seeking treatment. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 60, 998-1009. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_JCPP_2019.pdf
• Slavich, G. M., & Irwin, M. R. (2014). From stress to inflammation and major depressive disorder: A social signal transduction theory of depression. Psychological Bulletin, 140, 774-815. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_Irwin_PsychBull_2014.pdf
• Slavich, G. M. (2020). Social safety theory: A biologically based evolutionary perspective on life stress, health, and behavior. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 16, 265-295. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_AnnualReview_2020.pdf
• Slavich, G. M., Roos, L. G., Mengelkoch, S., Webb, C. A., Shattuck, E. C., Moriarity, D. P., & Alley, J. C. (2023). Social Safety Theory: Conceptual foundation, underlying mechanisms, and future directions. Health Psychology Review, 17, 5-59. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_HealthPsychReview_2023.pdf

Keely Muscatell: 

• Muscatell KA, Inagaki TK. (2021). Beyond social withdrawal: New perspectives on the effects of inflammation on social behavior. Brain Behav Immun Health, 16:100302. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8474589/pdf/main.pdf
• Feldman MJ, Jolink TA, Alvarez GM, Fendinger NJ, Gaudier-Diaz MM, Lindquist KA, Muscatell KA. The roles of inflammation, affect, and interoception in predicting social perception. Brain Behav Immun. 2023, 112:246-253. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10528976/pdf/nihms-1914636.pdf

Holmes and Rahe:

• Life Change Stress Test: https://www.dartmouth.edu/eap/library/lifechangestresstest.pdf 
• Holmes, T. H., & Rahe, R. H. (1967). The social readjustment rating scale. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 11(2), 213–218. https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-3999(67)90010-4

ME Seligman:

• Maier SF, Seligman ME. (2016). Learned helplessness at fifty: insights from neuroscience. Psychol.Rev. 123:34967.

Lazarus and Folkman:

• Lazarus R. S., Folkman S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal and Coping. New York: Springer 

Aaron Beck: 

• Clark DA, Beck AT.1999. Scientific Foundations of Cognitive Theory of Depression. New York: Wiley

George Brown and Tirill Harris:

• Allan O. House, Harry B. Andrews, Life events and difficulties preceding the onset of functional dysphonia, Journal of Psychosomatic Research, Volume 32, Issue 3, 1988, Pages 311-319, ISSN 0022-3999, https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-3999(88)90073-6.
• https://www.amazon.com/Life-Events-Illness-Brown-Harris/dp/0898627230/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1341329487&sr=1-1&keywords=Life+events+and+illness 

Paul Gilbert: 

• Gilbert P. 2005. Social mentalities: a biopsychosocial and evolutionary approach to social relationships. In Interpersonal Cognition, ed. MW Baldwin, pp. 299–333. New York: Guilford Press.
• Gilbert P, Allan S. 1998. The role of defeat and entrapment (arrested flight) in depression: an exploration of an evolutionary view. Psychol. Med. 28:585–98.

Stress and Adversity Inventory (STRAIN):

• Overview & Articles: https://www.uclastresslab.org/projects/strain-stress-and-adversity-inventory/
• Adolescent STRAIN: Slavich, G. M., Stewart, J. G., Esposito, E. C., Shields, G. S., & Auerbach, R. P. (2019). The Stress and Adversity Inventory for Adolescents (Adolescent STRAIN): associations with mental and physical health, risky behaviors, and psychiatric diagnoses in youth seeking treatment. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 60, 998-1009. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_JCPP_2019.pdf
• Adult STRAIN: Slavich, G. M., & Shields, G. S. (2018). Assessing lifetime stress exposure using the Stress and Adversity Inventory for Adults (Adult STRAIN): An overview and initial validation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 80, 17-27. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Slavich_PsychosomaticMedicine_2018.pdf

Multi-Omics:

• Mengelkoch, S., Miryam Schüssler-Fiorenza Rose, S., Lautman, Z., Alley, J. C., Roos, L. G., Ehlert, B., Moriarity, D. P., Lancaster, S., Snyder, M. P., & Slavich, G. M. (2023). Multi-omics approaches in psychoneuroimmunology and health research: Conceptual considerations and methodological recommendations. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, 114, 475-487. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Mengelkoch_BBI_2023.pdf
• Mengelkoch, S., Gassen, J., Lev-Ari, S., Alley, J. C., Schüssler-Fiorenza Rose, S. M., Snyder, M. P., & Slavich, G. M. (2024). Multi-omics in stress and health research: Study designs that will drive the field forward. Stress, 27, 2321610. https://www.uclastresslab.org/pubs/Mengelkoch_Stress_2024.pdf

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The Stress Puzzle is hosted by Dr. Ryan L. Brown (https://www.ryanlinnbrown.com/) and
supported by the UCSF Stress Measurement Network, an NIH/NIA funded network which
aims to better understand the relationship between stress and health by improving the
measurement of stress in research studies. Learn more about available resources to support
stress research at: www.stressmeasurement.org.

Have burning questions about stress? Email us at stresspuzzlepod@gmail.com and we may
feature your question in a future episode!