Discuss the Relationship Between Stress and the Immune System

Discuss the human descent between judge and the immune system (12) Cohen et al (1993) investigated the role of public life stress on the vulnerability to the special K algid virus. 394 participants stainless a questionnaire about the number of stressful events that occurred the previous year. They were similarly asked to straddle the degree of stress and level of negative emotions. The three scores were have together to make what Cohen called a stress index. The participants were then exposed to the common cold virus and 82% became infected.The results showed that the chance of developing a cold was significantly correlated with stress index. Cohen et al concluded that life stress and negative emotions reduce the effectiveness of the immune system. However a reprimand of this study would be that there was no direct manipulation of the self-employed person variable which was the stress index, so a drive and effect relationship cannot be confirmed. Also, its not easy to te ll if whether the participants who reported regurgitate was due to stress or other extraneous variables.Kiecolt-Glaser et al (1984) also investigated the impact of life stressors on the immune system. The participants were 75 medical examination students who were preparing for last(a) exams. The natural killer (NK) cell natural action was measured to use as an index of immune function. Measures of NK cell activity were recorded from blood samples 1 month before exams and one during exam period. Participants also completed a questionnaire on experience of negative life events and genial isolation. The results showed that NK cell activity was significantly lower on high stress blood samples in comparison to low stress samples.Additionally, the greatest reductions were in students who had higher levels of social isolation. Kiecolt-Glaser concluded that examination stress reduces immune function thus fashioning people more vulnerable to illnesses and infections. A criticism of thi s study would be that there was no manipulation of the independent variable so the cause and effect relationship cannot be confirmed. Also, the experiment cannot be generalised as it used medical students therefore the results are specific only to medical students and when used on others the results may be significantly different.