The Stress Puzzle

Managing our emotions is a central task of being human, and the science of emotion regulation as we study it today is a relatively young field. It's an especially exciting area for research questions that can add nuance to our understanding of how the "best" emotion regulation strategy for a situation may depend on the type of psychological stressor. For today's episode, I spok...

Death, dying, and grief are topics we often avoid but are central to our experience of being human. Today's guest, Dr. Mary-Frances O'Connor, studies the neurobiology behind how our brains grapple with the death of a loved one. Although grief isn't a light topic, Dr. O'Connor walks us through this research in a way that is absolutely captivating. Throughout this conversation, w...

In the midst of this season of gratitude, I feel especially grateful to be able to share this episode with you featuring Dr. Danielle King and focusing on the meaning and measurement of resilience. Our conversation focused primarily on resilience in the workplace and how stigma, chronic stress, and systemic factors shape the opportunity for resilience - drawing from her recent paper in  American P...

For this episode, I spoke with Dr. Michael Kraus about the widening gap between the richest and the poorest in our society (aka rising economic inequality). We discussed how social class shapes every domain of our lives and how class segregation creates distinct cultural patterns and norms. Dr. Kraus also emphasized how quickly and acurately people can perceive social class, the psychological mech...

For this episode, I spoke with Dr. Jay Van Bavel about political polarization as a threat to individual and societal health, which is particularly salient as we're seeing more politically-motivated violence. Specifically, we discussed the dangers of rising political polarization, how social media incentives contribute to polarization, and why we should consider political polarization as a soc...

Season 2 is here and we're focused on stress in context ! In this episode, I chatted with Dr. Wendy Berry Mendes about the evolution of stress and emotion research and how these fields have grown together. We also talk about distinctions between stress and emotions, and how their differences lead to meaningful differences in measurement. We wrap up with a discussion around the importance of c...

In honor of a new academic year, we wanted to share some advice and reflections from our Season 1 guests. This is a mix of clips with some that have been included in prior episodes and some that we've saved just for this episode. We wanted to have these reflections consolidated so it would be easy for you to share with trainees and early-career researchers, as well as anyone who may be thinki...

For our final episode of Season 1, I spoke with Dr. Andrew Steptoe about social relationships as we age, the need for interdisciplinary research, and emerging biomarkers of interest to stress scientists. Dr. Steptoe is both a prolific and brilliant scientist whose work has identified psychobiological pathways linking low socioeconomic status with cardiovascular disease progression. I especially en...

In today's episode of the Stress Puzzle, I chatted with Dr. David Almeida all about how we experience and respond (emotionally and physiologically) to daily stressors. We talked a fascinating finding of his that ~10% of people report no daily stressors and what he's learned about these folks. We also disucssed how everyday stress and emotion processes shift as we age, and what we gain fr...

In today's episode, I had the privilege of speaking with Dr. Cheryl Woods Giscombé, a health scientist who discusses her research on Superwoman Schema, which is a conceptual framework highlighting stress and coping mechanisms among African American women. The framework identifies five characteristics: obligation to present strength, obligation to suppress emotions, motivation to succeed despi...

Today's episode builds on the discussion of puberty as a sensitive period from the previous episode with Dr. Megan Gunnar. Featuring developmental scientist Dr. Ronald Dahl, this conversation explores early adolescence as a pivotal transition, highlighting the unique vulnerabilities and opportunities for positive growth during this formative window. Dr. Dahl emphasizes the importance of suppo...

For today's episode, I had the honor of speaking with Dr. Megan Gunnar, a developmental psychologist who discusses her research on early life adversity and stress biology showing the importance of puberty as a window of biological flexibility. Dr. Gunnar discussed work from earlier in her career that led her to pursue these questions through an interdisciplinary lens. Tune in next month to he...

Can you believe it's almost the end of 2024?! Join me for a conversation with Dr. Aric Prather about stress, sleep, and social experiences at the holidays + what we know about links between those and our susceptibility to infections and severity of illness. We chatted about foundational knowledge drawn from studies where people are experimentally exposed to rhinovirus (aka the common cold) be...

Welcome back to the Stress Puzzle! This is the second of two episodes highlighting winners of the Stress Measurement Network's (SMN) Stress Science Paper Award . Today we'll hear from the lead author of the winning paper in the Human Empirical/Clinical category, Dr. Tené Lewis. We discussed the findings of their paper, which highlights the importance of stress experienced by close loved...

Welcome back to the Stress Puzzle! This is the first of two episodes highlighting winners of the Stress Measurement Network's (SMN) Stress Science Paper Award . Today we'll hear from the lead author of the winning paper in the Basic Science category, Dr. Natalia Bobba-Alves. We discussed the findings and implications of their paper (particularly around hypermetabolism, chronic stress, an...

Welcome back to the Stress Puzzle! I had the joy of speaking with Dr. Jenny Tung, an evolutionary anthropologist and geneticist who discusses her intergenerational and experimental research showing how the social environment affects health and lifespan in non-human primates. She shared about her creative methods to experiment with social hierarchies and the special experience of collaborating with...

Welcome back to the Stress Puzzle! For this episode, I was joined by Dr. Michael Marmot who is an expert on social status and health. We discussed his seminal work on the Whitehall Studies of British Civil Servants, translating research into policy, and how he remains an "evidence-based optimist" through it all. Tune in next month to hear about complementary research conducted by Dr. Jen...

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 translat...

Welcome to the first episode of the Stress Puzzle! For this episode, I was joined by experts in the field of stress, Dr. Elissa Epel and Dr. Wendy Berry Mendes. Dr. Elissa Epel has focused on linking chronic stress to health, and Dr. Wendy Berry Mendes has focused on characterizing acute stress responses. They've been working together for over 10 years and have been co-leading the Stress Meas...