Neurophysiological analysis of disadvantageous social inequity: Exploring emotional behavior changes and c-Fos expression in a male rat model.

Humans and other animals exhibit aversive behavioral and emotional responses to unequal reward distributions compared with their conspecifics. Despite the significance of this phenomenon, experimental animal models designed to investigate social inequity aversion and delve into the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms are limited. In this study, we developed a rat model to determine the effects of socially equal or unequal reward and stress on emotional changes in male rats. During the training session, the rats were trained to escape when a sound cue was presented, and they were assigned to one of the following groups: all escaping rats [advantageous equity (AE)], freely moving rats alongside a restrained rat [advantageous inequity (AI)], all restrained rats [disadvantageous equity (DE)], and a rat restrained in the presence of freely moving companions [disadvantageous inequity (DI)]. During the test session, rats in the advantageous group (AE and AI) escaped after the cue sound (expected reward acquisition), whereas rats in the disadvantageous group (DE and DI) could not escape despite the cue being presented (expected reward deprivation). Emotional alteration induced by exposure to restraint stress under various social interaction circumstances was examined using an open field test. Notably, the DI group displayed reduced exploration of the center zone during the open field tests compared with the other groups, indicating heightened anxiety-like behaviors in response to reward inequity. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed increased c-Fos expression in the medial prefrontal and orbitofrontal cortices, coupled with reduced c-Fos expression in the striatum and nucleus accumbens under DI conditions, in contrast to the other experimental conditions. These findings provide compelling evidence that rats are particularly sensitive to reward inequity, shedding light on the neurophysiological basis for distinct cognitive processes that manifest when individuals are exposed to social equity and inequity situations.

The neurophysiological consequences of racism-related stressors in Black Americans.

Racism-related stressors, from experiences of both implicit and explicit racial discrimination to systemic socioeconomic disadvantage, have a cumulative impact on Black Americans' health. The present narrative review synthesizes peripheral (neuroendocrine and inflammation markers), psychophysiological (heart-rate variability, skin conductance), and neuroimaging (structural and functional) findings that demonstrate unique associations with racism-related stress. Emerging evidence reveals how racism-related stressors contribute to differential physiological and neural responses and may have distinct impacts on regions involved with threat and social processing. Ultimately, the neurophysiological effects of racism-related stress may confer biological susceptibility to stress and trauma-related disorders. We note critical gaps in the literature on the neurophysiological impact of racism-related stress and outline additional research that is needed on the multifactorial interactions between racism and mental health. A clearer understanding of the interactions between racism-related stress, neurophysiology, and stress- and trauma-related disorders is critical for preventative efforts, biomarker discovery, and selection of effective clinical treatments for Black Americans.

Racial/Ethnic Differences in Women's Life Event Exposure Across Midlife.

OBJECTIVE: Stressful life events are associated with poorer physical, cognitive, and mental health. Examining life events trends across midlife illustrates normative experiences of stress in a critical life period for intervention and disease prevention. Further, there is a critical need for research with racially/ethnically diverse samples to identify differences in life event exposure, as they may relate to later health disparities. METHOD: Annual life event reports were analyzed from 3,066 White, Black, Hispanic, Chinese, and Japanese women in the Study of Women's Health Across the Nation. Across ages 43-65, longitudinal trajectories were fit to annual number of life events and 9 subcategories of life events (i.e., work problems, economic problems, partner unemployment, illness/accident of loved one, caregiving, bereavement, relationship problems, family legal/police problems, and violent events that happened to the self or family). Racial/ethnic differences were examined, controlling for education. RESULTS: Number of annual life events declined with age and plateaued in later midlife. This pattern was largely consistent across types of life events, though family health and bereavement-related life events increased in later midlife. Compared to White women, Black women experienced more life events, while Chinese, Hispanic, and Japanese women experienced fewer life events. Racial/ethnic differences were amplified in specific subtypes of life events. DISCUSSION: Racial/ethnic differences in exposure to life events across midlife may contribute to racial/ethnic health disparities in later life.

Staying informed without a cost: No effect of positive news media on stress reactivity, memory and affect in young adults.

INTRODUCTION: We read, see and hear news from various media sources every day. A large majority of the news is negative. A previous study from our laboratory showed that reading negative news is associated with both increased stress reactivity (measured via the stress hormone cortisol) and recall of the negative news segments in women. OBJECTIVES: The present study investigated the effects of positive news on cortisol stress reactivity, memory and affect using a methodology highly similar to the study on negative news that was previously used by our team. METHODS: Sixty-two healthy participants aged between 18 and 35 years (81% women) were randomly exposed to either positive or neutral news segments, followed by a laboratory stressor. We assessed participants' affect three times during the procedure and measured cortisol in saliva eight times (at 10-minute intervals). Twenty-four hours later, participants were contacted by phone to assess their recall of the news segments. RESULTS: Results showed that exposure to positive news, relative to neutral news, did not modulate participants' cortisol levels in response to the laboratory stressor. Positive news had no impact on memory recall of the news and did not change participants' positive or negative affect. Bayes factors suggested that these nonsignificant results are not attributable to low statistical power. CONCLUSION: Contrary to negative news, positive and neutral news do not modulate stress reactivity, memory and affect. These results suggest that people can stay informed without physiological and psychological costs when the news to which they are exposed adopt a positive or neutral approach.

Sense of coherence, social support and religiosity as resources for medical personnel during the COVID-19 pandemic: A web-based survey among 4324 health care workers within the German Network University Medicine.

INTRODUCTION: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in severe detrimental effects on the mental well-being of health care workers (HCW). Consequently, there has been a need to identify health-promoting resources in order to mitigate the psychological impact of the pandemic on HCW. OBJECTIVE: Our objective was to investigate the association of sense of coherence (SOC), social support and religiosity with self-reported mental symptoms and increase of subjective burden during the COVID-19 pandemic in HCW. METHODS: Our sample comprised 4324 HCW of four professions (physicians, nurses, medical technical assistants (MTA) and pastoral workers) who completed an online survey from 20 April to 5 July 2020. Health-promoting resources were assessed using the Sense of Coherence Scale Short Form (SOC-3), the ENRICHD Social Support Inventory (ESSI) and one item on religiosity derived from the Scale of Transpersonal Trust (TPV). Anxiety and depression symptoms were measured with the PHQ-2 and GAD-2. The increase of subjective burden due to the pandemic was assessed as the retrospective difference between burden during the pandemic and before the pandemic. RESULTS: In multiple regressions, higher SOC was strongly associated with fewer anxiety and depression symptoms. Higher social support was also related to less severe mental symptoms, but with a smaller effect size, while religiosity showed minimal to no correlation with anxiety or depression. In professional group analysis, SOC was negatively associated with mental symptoms in all groups, while social support only correlated significantly with mental health outcomes in physicians and MTA. In the total sample and among subgroups, an increase of subjective burden was meaningfully associated only with a weaker SOC. CONCLUSION: Perceived social support and especially higher SOC appeared to be beneficial for mental health of HCW during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the different importance of the resources in the respective occupations requires further research to identify possible reasons.

Childhood psychosocial stress is linked with impaired vascular endothelial function, lower SIRT1, and oxidative stress in young adulthood.

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are psychosocial stressors that occur during sensitive developmental windows and are associated with increased lifetime cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in a dose-dependent manner. Vascular endothelial dysfunction is a pathophysiological mechanism that promotes hypertension and CVD and may be a mechanism by which ACEs contribute to lifetime CVD risk. We examined whether exposure to ACEs is associated with reduced vascular endothelial function (VEF) in otherwise healthy, young adult women (20.7 ± 3 yr) with (ACE+) versus without (ACE-) ACEs, explored whether differences in circulating sirtuin 1 (SIRT1) or systemic oxidative stress could explain ACEs-related differences in VEF, and examined the ability of a pilot, 8-wk exercise intervention to augment VEF and SIRT1 or reduce oxidized LDL cholesterol (oxLDL) in ACE+ young adult women. Forty-two otherwise healthy young adults completed this study. Prior to the intervention, VEF (P = 0.002) and SIRT1 (P = 0.004) were lower in the ACE+ than ACE- group, but oxLDL concentrations were not different (P = 0.77). There were also significant relationships (P ≤ 0.04) among flow-mediated dilation (FMD), SIRT1, and oxLDL in the ACE+, but not ACE- group. Adjusting for circulating SIRT1 and oxLDL reduced the differences in FMD observed between groups (P = 0.10), but only SIRT1 was a significant adjuster of the means (P < 0.05). Finally, the exercise intervention employed was unable to enhance VEF or SIRT1 in the ACE+ exercise group. Our data suggest that ACEs likely increase susceptibility to hypertension and CVD by causing endothelial dysfunction, perhaps through a SIRT1 pathway-related mechanism.NEW & NOTEWORTHY Our study provides novel evidence that young adult women with moderate-to-severe adverse childhood experience (ACE) exposure present impaired endothelial function and lower circulating sirtuin 1 (SIRT1) concentrations than age-matched controls. However, an 8-wk exercise intervention was unable to augment endothelial function or SIRT1 concentrations in a subset of those with ACEs. Our data suggest that ACEs-related impairments in endothelial function may be secondary to decreased NO bioavailability via SIRT1 and/or oxidative stress-related mechanisms.

Do trait psychological characteristics moderate sympathetic arousal to racial discrimination exposure in a natural setting?

Personality and psychological traits are known to influence how individuals react to and cope with stress, and thus, have downstream health and aging consequences. However, research considering psychological health traits as individual-level difference factors moderating the links been racism-related stress and health for racial and ethnic minorities in the United States is rare. Using intensive daily diaries and a wearable sensor that continuously recorded sympathetic nervous system arousal in a sample of racial and ethnic minority college students (80% African American, first-generation Black, or African; 20% Latinx), we linked arousal to racism-related experiences dynamically throughout the day as participants naturally went about their lives. Findings suggest that multiple traits are associated with increased arousal in real time when interpersonal discrimination is perceived, but that only anger and anxiety also predicted increased arousal during moments of rumination and reflection on race-related inequities. Vicarious discrimination exposure moments were also linked to suppressed arousal in general, but particularly for more anxious individuals. We use a stress appraisal and coping framework to elucidate the ways in which individual psychological differences may inform physiological responses to race-related stress. The biopsychosocial pathways by which cognitive appraisal and interpersonal race-related stress contribute to racial health disparities are also discussed.

Leveraging the Biology of Adversity and Resilience to Transform Pediatric Practice.

Advances in science are fundamentally changing the way we understand how inextricable interactions among genetic predispositions, physical and social environments, and developmental timing influence early childhood development and the foundations of health and how significant early adversity can lead to a lifetime of chronic health impairments. This article and companion article illustrate the extent to which differential outcomes are shaped by ongoing interactive adaptations to context that begin at or even before conception and continue throughout life, with increasing evidence pointing to the importance of the prenatal period and early infancy for the developing brain, the immune system, and metabolic regulation. Although new discoveries in the basic sciences are transforming tertiary medical care and producing breakthrough outcomes in treating disease, this knowledge is not being leveraged effectively to inform new approaches to promoting whole-child development and preventing illness. The opportunity for pediatrics to serve as the leading edge of science-based innovation across the early childhood ecosystem has never been more compelling. In this article, we present a framework for leveraging the frontiers of scientific discovery to inform new strategies in pediatric practice and advocacy to protect all developing biological systems from the disruptive effects of excessive early adversity beyond providing information on child development for parents and enriched learning experiences for young children.

Genes, Environments, and Time: The Biology of Adversity and Resilience.

Exposures to adverse environments, both psychosocial and physicochemical, are prevalent and consequential across a broad range of childhood populations. Such adversity, especially early in life, conveys measurable risk to learning and behavior and to the foundations of both mental and physical health. Using an interactive gene-environment-time (GET) framework, we survey the independent and interactive roles of genetic variation, environmental context, and developmental timing in light of advances in the biology of adversity and resilience, as well as new discoveries in biomedical research. Drawing on this rich evidence base, we identify 4 core concepts that provide a powerful catalyst for fresh thinking about primary health care for young children: (1) all biological systems are inextricably integrated, continuously "reading" and adapting to the environment and "talking back" to the brain and each other through highly regulated channels of cross-system communication; (2) adverse environmental exposures induce alterations in developmental trajectories that can lead to persistent disruptions of organ function and structure; (3) children vary in their sensitivity to context, and this variation is influenced by interactions among genetic factors, family and community environments, and developmental timing; and (4) critical or sensitive periods provide unmatched windows of opportunity for both positive and negative influences on multiple biological systems. These rapidly moving frontiers of investigation provide a powerful framework for new, science-informed thinking about health promotion and disease prevention in the early childhood period.

Update on the neurodevelopmental theory of depression: is there any 'unconscious code'?

Depression is currently one of the most common psychiatric disorders and the number of patients receiving antidepressant treatment is increasing every year. Therefore, it is essential to understand the underlying mechanisms that are associated with higher prevalence of depression. The main component leading to the change in functioning, in the form of apathy, anhedonia, lack of motivation and sleep disturbances, is stress. This is the factor that in recent decades-due to the civilization speed, dynamic technological development as well as competitiveness and competition in relationships-significantly affects the psychophysical condition, which results in an increase in the prevalence of civilization diseases, including depression. To understand the mechanism of susceptibility to this disease, one should consider the significant role of the interaction between immune and nervous systems. Their joint development from the moment of conception is a matrix of later predispositions, both associated with the mobilization of the proinflammatory pathways (TNFα, IL-1ß, IL-6) and associated with psychological coping with stress. Such an early development period is associated with epigenetic processes that are strongly marked in prenatal development up to 1 year of age and determinate the characteristic phenotype for various forms of pathology, including depression. Regarding the inflammatory hypothesis of depression, interleukin 17 (IL-17), among other proinflammatory cytokines, might play an important role in the development of depressive disorders. It is secreted by Th17 cells, crossed the placental barrier and acts on the brain structures of the fetus by increasing IL-17 receptor levels and affecting the intensity of its signaling in the brain.

Prepubertal Internalizing Symptoms and Timing of Puberty Onset in Girls.

Stressful environments have been associated with earlier menarche. We hypothesized that anxiety, and possibly other internalizing symptoms, are also associated with earlier puberty in girls. The Lessons in Epidemiology and Genetics of Adult Cancer From Youth (LEGACY) Girls Study (2011-2016) included 1,040 girls aged 6-13 years at recruitment whose growth and development were assessed every 6 months. Prepubertal maternal reports of daughter's internalizing symptoms were available for breast onset (n = 447), pubic hair onset (n = 456), and menarche (n = 681). Using Cox proportional hazard regression, we estimated prospective hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals for the relationship between 1 standard deviation of the percentiles of prepubertal anxiety, depression, and somatization symptoms and the timing of each pubertal outcome. Multivariable models included age, race/ethnicity, study center, maternal education, body mass index percentile, and family history of breast cancer. Additional models included maternal self-reported anxiety. A 1-standard deviation increase in maternally reported anxiety in girls at baseline was associated with earlier subsequent onset of breast (hazard ratio (HR) = 1.22, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.09, 1.36) and pubic hair (HR = 1.15, 95% CI: 1.01, 1.30) development, but not menarche (HR = 0.94, 95% CI: 0.83, 1.07). The association of anxiety with earlier breast development persisted after adjustment for maternal anxiety. Increased anxiety in young girls may indicate risk for earlier pubertal onset.

Race and ethnic variation in college students' allostatic regulation of racism-related stress.

Racism-related stress is thought to contribute to widespread race/ethnic health inequities via negative emotion and allostatic stress process up-regulation. Although prior studies document race-related stress and health correlations, due to methodological and technical limitations, they have been unable to directly test the stress-reactivity hypothesis in situ. Guided by theories of constructed emotion and allostasis, we developed a protocol using wearable sensors and daily surveys that allowed us to operationalize and time-couple self-reported racism-related experiences, negative emotions, and an independent biosignal of emotional arousal. We used data from 100 diverse young adults at a predominantly White college campus to assess racism-related stress reactivity using electrodermal activity (EDA), a biosignal of sympathetic nervous system activity. We find that racism-related experiences predict both increased negative emotion risk and heightened EDA, consistent with the proposed allostatic model of health and disease. Specific patterns varied across race/ethnic groups. For example, discrimination and rumination were associated with negative emotion for African American students, but only interpersonal discrimination predicted increased arousal via EDA. The pattern of results was more general for Latinx students, for whom interpersonal discrimination, vicarious racism exposure, and rumination significantly modulated arousal. As with Latinx students, African students were particularly responsive to vicarious racism while 1.5 generation Black students were generally not responsive to racism-related experiences. Overall, these findings provide support for allostasis-based theories of mental and physical health via a naturalistic assessment of the emotional and sympathetic nervous system responding to real-life social experiences.

Associations between stress exposure and new mothers' brain responses to infant cry sounds.

Exposure to severe stress has been linked to negative postpartum outcomes among new mothers including mood disorders and harsh parenting. Non-human animal studies show that stress exposure disrupts the normative adaptation of the maternal brain, thus identifying a neurobiological mechanism by which stress can lead to negative maternal outcomes. However, little is known about the impact of stress exposure on the maternal brain response to infant cues in human mothers. We examined the association of stress exposure with brain response to infant cries and maternal behaviors, in a socioeconomically diverse (low- and middle-income) sample of first-time mothers (N=53). Exposure to stress across socioeconomic, environmental, and psychosocial domains was associated with reduced brain response to infant cry sounds in several regions, including the right insula/inferior frontal gyrus and superior temporal gyrus. Reduced activation in these regions was further associated with lower maternal sensitivity observed during a mother-infant interaction. The findings demonstrate that higher levels of stress exposure may be associated with reduced brain response to an infant's cry in regions that are important for emotional and social information processing, and that reduced brain responses may further be associated with increased difficulties in developing positive mother-infant relationships.

Psychological stress and cortisol during pregnancy: An ecological momentary assessment (EMA)-Based within- and between-person analysis.

BACKGROUND: Although the linkage between psychological stress and cortisol is believed to mediate the association of stress with health outcomes, several studies have been unable to demonstrate this association. We suggest this inability may be a consequence of limitations in the measurement approach and/or reliance on analytic strategies that focus on associations across, rather than within individuals. The link between psychological stress and cortisol is of particular interest in the context of pregnancy and fetal development. Using an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) design, we examined the association between psychological stress and cortisol at the between- and the within-person level. METHODS: 152 participants completed a 4-day long EMA protocol serially in early, mid and late pregnancy to provide momentary stress appraisals (average of 150 measures/subject) and saliva samples (average of 55 samples/subject) for quantification of cortisol. The association between stress and cortisol was estimated using linear mixed models. RESULTS: After accounting for the effects of key determinants of variation in cortisol, momentary stress was significantly and positively associated with cortisol at the within-person level (B = .030, p = .031), but not at the between-person level. No association was evident for traditional retrospective measures of stress with cortisol at either the between- or the within-person level. CONCLUSIONS: Our study highlights the value of EMA methods and linear mixed-modeling approaches in linking maternal psychological and physiological states across pregnancy. These findings may have important implications for the development of personalized risk identification and "just-in-time" intervention strategies to optimize maternal and child health.

COVID-19 Is Straining Mental Health-Could Technology Be the Answer?

One of the most pernicious side effects of the COVID-19 pandemic is a steep rise in stress and mental health problems. According to a poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly half of American adults say that worry and stress about the pandemic is hurting their mental health [1]. There are plenty of factors feeding into this phenomenon. People are anxious about getting sick, grieving lost loved ones, and experiencing financial stress, parental stress, and loneliness. The pandemic places additional burdens on essential workers and people of color, both of whom are at greater risk of dying from the disease. COVID-19 itself has been linked to neurological problems as well as anxiety, depression, and sleep disorders [2].

Psychology and neuroscience applied to financial decision-making.

All financial bubbles eventually burst and cause financial crises. In 2008 the US housing bubble burst, causing the global economy to suffer for 4 years. While the 2008 crisis received considerable attention because of its global impact, in the 21st century alone, there have been more than 10 financial crises. While economic, political and legal analysis of the crises have dominated academia, this dissertation argues that an interdisciplinary approach to financial market analysis is required to better understand why they occur. This argument is based on the idea, that the choices of traders are at the core of this issue, and consequently an understanding of trader decision-making behavior was required. Economic models of decision-making are unable to explain this behavior, as they assume decision-making to be an entirely rational process. To address this limitation, findings in neuroscience, psychology and biology are considered. Using this approach, this chapter outlines the role of different neural mechanisms, gut-feelings and hormonal states, that facilitate irrational behavior and increase a trader's susceptibility to partake in bubble markets.

Greater Neurobiological Resilience to Chronic Socioeconomic or Environmental Stressors Associates With Lower Risk for Cardiovascular Disease Events.

BACKGROUND: Chronic exposure to socioeconomic or environmental stressors associates with greater stress-related neurobiological activity (ie, higher amygdalar activity [AmygA]) and higher risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE). However, among individuals exposed to such stressors, it is unknown whether neurobiological resilience (NBResilience, defined as lower AmygA despite stress exposure) lowers MACE risk. We tested the hypotheses that NBResilience protects against MACE, and that it does so through decreased bone marrow activity and arterial inflammation. METHODS: Individuals underwent 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography; AmygA, bone marrow activity, and arterial inflammation were quantified. Chronic socioeconomic and environmental stressors known to associate with AmygA and MACE (ie, transportation noise exposure, neighborhood median household income, and crime rate) were quantified. Heightened stress exposure was defined as exposure to at least one chronic stressor (ie, the highest tertile of noise exposure or crime or lowest tertile of income). MACE within 5 years of imaging was adjudicated. Relationships were evaluated using linear and Cox regression, Kaplan-Meier survival, and mediation analyses. RESULTS: Of 254 individuals studied (median age [interquartile range]: 57 years [46-67], 36.7% male), 166 were exposed to at least one chronic stressor. Among stress-exposed individuals, 12 experienced MACE over a median follow-up of 3.75 years. Among this group, higher AmygA (ie, lower resilience) associated with higher bone marrow activity (standardized ß [95% CI]: 0.192 [0.030-0.353], P=0.020), arterial inflammation (0.203 [0.055-0.351], P=0.007), and MACE risk (standardized hazard ratio [95% CI]: 1.927 [1.370-2.711], P=0.001). The effect of NBResilience on MACE risk was significantly mediated by lower arterial inflammation (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Among individuals who are chronically exposed to socioeconomic or environmental stressors, NBResilience (AmygA <1 SD above the mean) associates with a >50% reduction in MACE risk, potentially via reduced arterial inflammation. These data raise the possibility that enhancing NBResilience may decrease the burden of cardiovascular disease.

When Is Hope Enough? Hopefulness, Discrimination and Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Allostatic Load.

Hopefulness is associated with better health and may be integral for stress adaptation and resilience. Limited research has prospectively examined whether hopefulness protects against physiological dysregulation or does so similarly for U.S. whites, blacks and Hispanics. We examined the association between baseline hopefulness and future allostatic load using data from the Health and Retirement Study (n = 8,486) and assessed differences in this association by race/ethnicity and experiences of discrimination. Four items measured hopefulness and allostatic load was a count of seven biomarkers for which a respondent's measured value was considered high-risk for disease. A dichotomous variable assessed whether respondents experienced at least one major act of discrimination in their lifetime. We used Poisson regression to examine the association between hopefulness and allostatic load and included a multiplicative interaction term to test racial/ethnic differences in this association. Subsequent analyses were stratified by race/ethnicity and tested the interaction between hopefulness and discrimination within each racial/ethnic group. Hopefulness was associated with lower allostatic load scores, but its effects varied significantly by race/ethnicity. Race-stratified analyses suggested that hopefulness was protective among whites and not associated with allostatic load among Hispanics irrespective of experiencing discrimination. Hopefulness was associated with lower allostatic load among blacks reporting discrimination but associated with higher allostatic load among those who did not. Findings suggest that hopefulness plays differing roles for older whites, blacks and Hispanics and, for blacks, its protective effects on physiological dysregulation are intricately tied to their experiences of discrimination.

Psychological Needs, Assessment, and Treatment in the Care of Adults with Congenital Heart Disease.

Although the majority of congenital heart disease survivors are thriving, many are at risk for declining emotional well-being as they age. Emotional distress is a risk factor for poorer health outcomes and must be addressed. Primary care and cardiology teams may be the first line of defense in identifying and providing referral resources for symptoms of depression, anxiety, and medical trauma. The current review provides information about commonly used self-report measures of emotional distress to identify symptoms that warrant referral and describes multiple options for addressing these symptoms.

Women's socioeconomic position in ontogeny is associated with improved immune function and lower stress, but not with height.

Immune function, height and resource accumulation comprise important life history traits in humans. Resource availability models arising from life history theory suggest that socioeconomic conditions influence immune function, growth and health status. In this study, we tested whether there are associations between family income during ontogeny, adult height, cortisol level and immune response in women. A hepatitis B vaccine was administered to 66 young Latvian women from different socioeconomic backgrounds, and blood samples were then collected to measure the level of antibodies that the women produced in response to the vaccination. Cortisol levels were measured from plasma samples pre- and post-vaccination. Women from wealthier families had lower cortisol levels, and women from the highest family income group had the highest levels of antibody titers against hepatitis B vaccine. No significant relationships were observed between cortisol level and immune function, nor between family income and height. The results show that income level during ontogeny is associated with the strength of immune response and with psychoneuroendocrine pathways underlying stress perception in early adulthood. The findings indicate that the quality of the developmental niche is associated with the condition-dependent expression of immune function and stress response.