Did you know mere anticipation of stress in chronically stressed individuals causes degradation at the cellular level?

Team@CMHF

Previous studies have shown that stress can contribute to a range of health conditions, from the common cold to heart disease. Now new research from UC San Francisco suggests that the mere anticipation of a stressful situation may increase a person’s risk for age-related diseases.
In the study, researchers examined how major forms of stress in individuals’ lives can influence how they respond to more minor forms of stress and how this psychological response impacts neurobiology and cellular health. To do so, they informed 50 women, about half of which were caregivers for a relative with dementia (and who, presumably, deal with daily stress), that they would be asked to perform public speaking or math tasksAccording to a university release:
…The psychologists found that those most threatened by the anticipation of stressful tasks in the laboratory and through public speaking and solving math problems, looked older at the cellular level.
Based on that, the researchers propose that higher levels of anticipated threat in daily life may promote cellular aging in chronically stressed individuals.
Although the findings are preliminary, researchers say the study results are a significant step forward in their goal of understanding how psychological stress promotes biological aging and developing interventions to reduce the risk for disease in chronically stressed individuals.

Ref: http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2012/02/study-suggests-anticipation-of-stress-may-accelerate-cellular-aging