Stress Reactivity - An Individual's Different Approach

People vary in their reactivity to stress. Reactivity is the degree of change that occurs in automatic, neuroendocrine, and or immune responses as a result of stress. Reactivity is, in art, a predisposition to respond physiologically to environmental threats or challenges that may be implicated in both short- and long-term health complications due to stress. Some people show very small reactions to stressful circumstances, whereas others show large responses. These differences may be genetic in origin or develop prenatally or in early life.

Reactivity to stress can affect vulnerability to illness. For example, in one study, a group of children ranging in age from 3 to 5 yeas old were tested for their cardiovascular reactivity (change in heart rate and blood pressure) or their immune response to a vaccine challenge following a stressful task. Parents were then asked to report on the number of family stressors during a 12-week period, and illness rates were charted during this period. The results indicated that stress was associated with increased rates of illness only among the children who had previously shown strong immune or cardiovascular reactions. The less reactive children did not experience any change in illness under stressful circumstances.

Another study found that cardiovascular reactivity predicted stress-induced cortisol changes in a group of young, healthy college students performing a mental arithmetic task, higher reactivity was also related to changes in natural killer cell activity, providing evidence for the pathway between sympathetic activation and immune changes and possible risk for infectious disease.

Do changes like this actually lead to illness? Researcher found that people who reacted to laboratory stressors wit high cortisol responses and who also had a high level of negative life events were especially vulnerable to upper respiratory infection. People who reacted to laboratory stressors with low immune response were especially to upper respiratory infection if they were also under high stress. High immune reactors, in contrasts, did not show differences in upper respiratory illness as a function of the stress they experienced, perhaps because their immune systems were quick to respond to the threat that a potential infection posed.

Studies like these suggest that psychobiological reactivity to stress is an important factor that influences the effects that stress has on the body and the likelihood that it will contribute to distress or disease. Differences in reactivity are believed to contribute especially to the development of hypertension and coronary artery disease.