| Topic: |
Sociology > Depression |
| User: |
"Tim Silva" |
| Date: |
28 Feb 2007 02:52:59 PM |
| Object: |
Stressed out like a baboon! |
thinkanxiety.org - Why do humans and their primate cousins get more
stress-related diseases than any other member of the animal kingdom?
The answer, says Stanford University neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky,
is that people, apes and monkeys are highly intelligent, social
creatures with far too much spare time on their hands.
"Primates are super smart and organized just enough to devote their
free time to being miserable to each other and stressing each other
out," he said. "But if you get chronically, psychosocially stressed,
you're going to compromise your health. So, essentially, we've evolved
to be smart enough to make ourselves sick."
A professor of biological sciences and of neurology and neurological
sciences, Sapolsky has spent more than three decades studying the
physiological effects of stress on health. His pioneering work
includes ongoing studies of laboratory rats and wild baboons in the
African wilderness.
He discussed the biological and sociological implications of stress in
a lecture titled "Stress, Health and Coping" at the annual meeting of
the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San
Francisco.
Stress response
All vertebrates respond to stressful situations by releasing hormones,
such as adrenalin and glucocorticoids, which instantaneously increase
the animal's heart rate and energy level. "The stress response is
incredibly ancient evolutionarily," Sapolsky said. "Fish, birds and
reptiles secrete the same stress hormones we do, yet their metabolism
doesn't get messed up the way it does in people and other primates."
To understand why, he said, "just look at the dichotomy between what
your body does during real stress--for example, something is intent on
eating you and you're running for your life--versus what your body
does when you're turning on the same stress response for months on end
for purely psychosocial reasons."
.... http://www.thinkanxiety.org/article-read-48.htm
Tim Silva
.
|
|
| User: "Ivan Marsh" |
|
| Title: Re: Stressed out like a baboon! |
28 Feb 2007 03:27:18 PM |
|
|
On Wed, 28 Feb 2007 12:52:59 -0800, Tim Silva wrote:
thinkanxiety.org - Why do humans and their primate cousins get more
stress-related diseases than any other member of the animal kingdom?
The answer, says Stanford University neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky,
is that people, apes and monkeys are highly intelligent, social
creatures with far too much spare time on their hands.
....or, ignorance is bliss.
.
|
|
|
|
|
Related Articles |
|
|
