 | |
| Author | Robert Sapolsky |
|---|---|
| Country | US |
| Language | English |
| Subject | Stress |
| Genre | Non-fiction |
| Published | 1994 |
| Publisher | W. H. Freeman (2nd ed.), Holt Paperbacks (3rd ed.) |
| Pages | 320 |
| ISBN | 978-0-7167-3210-5 |
Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers is a 1994 (2nd ed. 1998, 3rd ed. 2004) book by Stanford University biologist Robert M. Sapolsky. The book includes the subtitle "A Guide to Stress, Stress-related Diseases, and Coping" on the front cover of its third edition.
The title derives from Sapolsky's premise that for animals such as zebras, stress is generally episodic (e.g., running away from a lion), while for humans, stress is often chronic (e.g., worrying about losing one's job). [1] Therefore, many wild animals are less susceptible than humans to chronic stress-related disorders such as ulcers, hypertension, decreased neurogenesis and increased hippocampal neuronal atrophy. However, chronic stress occurs in some social primates (Sapolsky studies baboons) for individuals on the lower side of the social dominance hierarchy.
Sapolsky focuses on the effects of glucocorticoids on the human body, arguing that such hormones may be useful to animals in the wild escaping their predators, (see Fight-or-flight response ) but the effects on humans, when secreted at high quantities or over long periods of time, are much less desirable. Sapolsky relates the history of endocrinology, how the field reacted at times of discovery, and how it has changed through the years. [2] While most of the book focuses on the biological machinery of the body, the last chapter of the book focuses on self-help.
Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers argues that social phenomena such as child abuse and the chronic stress of poverty affect biological stress, leading to increased risk of disease and disability.
The book received mostly positive reviews. Kirkus Reviews called it an "entertaining explanation of how stress affects the body and what we can do to counteract its effects." [3] Barry Keverne wrote in a review for New Scientist : "Everyone can benefit from reading Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers and gain insights into the workings of the body and mind, and why some of us are more vulnerable than others to stress-related illness." [1]
Psychosomatic medicine is an interdisciplinary medical field exploring the relationships among social, psychological, behavioral factors on bodily processes and quality of life in humans and animals.
Stress, whether physiological, biological or psychological, is an organism's response to a stressor such as an environmental condition. Stress is the body's method of reacting to a condition such as a threat, challenge or physical and psychological barrier. There are two hormones that an individual produces during a stressful situation, well known as adrenaline and cortisol. There are two kinds of stress hormone levels. Resting (basal) cortisol levels are normal everyday quantities that are essential for standard functioning. Reactive cortisol levels are increases in cortisol in response to stressors. Stimuli that alter an organism's environment are responded to by multiple systems in the body. In humans and most mammals, the autonomic nervous system and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis are the two major systems that respond to stress.
The fight-or-flight or the fight-flight-freeze-or-fawn is a physiological reaction that occurs in response to a perceived harmful event, attack, or threat to survival. It was first described by Walter Bradford Cannon. His theory states that animals react to threats with a general discharge of the sympathetic nervous system, preparing the animal for fighting or fleeing. More specifically, the adrenal medulla produces a hormonal cascade that results in the secretion of catecholamines, especially norepinephrine and epinephrine. The hormones estrogen, testosterone, and cortisol, as well as the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin, also affect how organisms react to stress. The hormone osteocalcin might also play a part.
Robert Morris Sapolsky is an American neuroendocrinology researcher and author. He is a professor of biology, neurology, neurological sciences, and neurosurgery at Stanford University. He is also a research associate at the National Museums of Kenya.
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons is a 2001 book by the American biologist Robert Sapolsky. The book documents Sapolsky's years in Kenya studying baboons as a graduate student. The chapters alternate between describing observations of a troop of baboons and the wildly different culture in Africa that he is increasingly cognizant of. The book portrays an unconventional way of studying neurophysiology to determine the effects of stress on life expectancy.
The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal is a 1991 book by academic and popular science author Jared Diamond, in which the author explores concepts relating to the animal origins of human behavior. The book follows a series of articles published by Diamond, a physiologist, examining the evidence and its interpretation in earlier treatments of the related species, including cultural characteristics or features often regarded as particularly unique to humans. The book was released in the United Kingdom in 1991 by Radius under the title The Rise and Fall of the Third Chimpanzee: How Our Animal Heritage Affects the Way We Live and in the United States in 1992 by HarperCollins under the title The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal. In 2014, Diamond published an adapted version for young people with Seven Stories Press titled, The Third Chimpanzee for Young People.
Allostasis (/ˌɑːloʊˈsteɪsɪs/) is a physiological mechanism of regulation in which the human body anticipates and adjusts its energy use according to environmental demands. First proposed by Peter Sterling and Joseph Eyer in 1988, the concept of allostasis shifts the focus away from the body maintaining a rigid internal set-point, as in homeostasis, to the brain's ability and role to interpret environmental stress and coordinate changes in the body using neurotransmitters, hormones, and other signaling mechanisms. Allostasis is believed to be not only involved in the body's stress response and adaptation to chronic stress; it may also have a role in the regulation of the immune system as well as in the development of chronic diseases such as hypertension and diabetes.
Allostatic load is "the wear and tear on the body" which accumulates as an individual is exposed to repeated or chronic stress. The term was coined by Bruce McEwen and Eliot Stellar in 1993. It represents the physiological consequences of chronic exposure to fluctuating or heightened neural or neuroendocrine response which results from repeated or prolonged chronic stress.
Phenoptosis is a conception of the self-programmed death of an organism proposed by Vladimir Skulachev in 1999.
Chronic stress is the physiological or psychological response induced by a long-term internal or external stressor. The stressor, either physically present or recollected, will produce the same effect and trigger a chronic stress response. There is a wide range of chronic stressors, but most entail relatively prolonged problems, conflicts and threats that people encounter on a daily basis. And several chronic stressors, including "neighbourhood environment, financial strain, interpersonal stress, work stress and caregiving.", have been identified as associated with disease and mortality.
In social psychology, social defeat is the negative experience of being excluded from the majority group. The term is used in the study of the physiological and behavioral effects of hostile interactions among either animals or humans, in either a dyadic or in a group-individual context, potentially greatly affecting control over resources, access to mates, and social positions.
Animal psychopathology is the study of mental or behavioral disorders in non-human animals.
Aquatic science is the study of the various bodies of water that make up our planet including oceanic and freshwater environments. Aquatic scientists study the movement of water, the chemistry of water, aquatic organisms, aquatic ecosystems, the movement of materials in and out of aquatic ecosystems, and the use of water by humans, among other things. Aquatic scientists examine current processes as well as historic processes, and the water bodies that they study can range from tiny areas measured in millimeters to full oceans. Moreover, aquatic scientists work in Interdisciplinary groups. For example, a physical oceanographer might work with a biological oceanographer to understand how physical processes, such as tropical cyclones or rip currents, affect organisms in the Atlantic Ocean. Chemists and biologists, on the other hand, might work together to see how the chemical makeup of a certain body of water affects the plants and animals that reside there. Aquatic scientists can work to tackle global problems such as global oceanic change and local problems, such as trying to understand why a drinking water supply in a certain area is polluted.
Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) is an eight-week evidence-based program that offers secular, intensive mindfulness training to assist people with stress, anxiety, depression and pain. Developed at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in the 1970s by Professor Jon Kabat-Zinn, MBSR uses a combination of mindfulness meditation, body awareness, yoga and exploration of patterns of behavior, thinking, feeling and action. Mindfulness can be understood as the non-judgmental acceptance and investigation of present experience, including body sensations, internal mental states, thoughts, emotions, impulses and memories, in order to reduce suffering or distress and to increase well-being. Mindfulness meditation is a method by which attention skills are cultivated, emotional regulation is developed, and rumination and worry are significantly reduced. During the past decades, mindfulness meditation has been the subject of more controlled clinical research, which suggests its potential beneficial effects for mental health, athletic performance, as well as physical health. While MBSR has its roots in wisdom teachings of Zen Buddhism, Hatha Yoga, Vipassana and Advaita Vedanta, the program itself is secular. The MBSR program is described in detail in Kabat-Zinn's 1990 book Full Catastrophe Living.
In psychology, stress is a feeling of emotional strain and pressure. Stress is a type of psychological pain. Small amounts of stress may be beneficial, as it can improve athletic performance, motivation and reaction to the environment. Excessive amounts of stress, however, can increase the risk of strokes, heart attacks, ulcers, and mental illnesses such as depression and also aggravation of a pre-existing condition.
Neurological reparative therapy (NRT) is a new model of treatment synthesized from a compilation of literature and research on how to better the lives of individuals who have a wide range of mental, emotional, and behavioral disturbances – particularly children and adolescents. Although the term "neurological reparative therapy" is new, the foundation of this model is not.
John Wayne Mason, M.D. was an American physiologist and researcher who specialized in the interplay between human emotions and the endocrine system. Mason is regarded as an international leader and theoretician in the field of stress research, where he was one of the field's most prominent voices speaking out against the reigning model of stress promoted by Hans Selye.
Emotional abandonment is a subjective emotional state in which people feel undesired, left behind, insecure, or discarded. People experiencing emotional abandonment may feel at a loss. They may feel like they have been cut off from a crucial source of sustenance or feel withdrawn, either suddenly or through a process of erosion. Emotional abandonment can manifest through loss or separation from a loved one.
Sociogenomics, also known as social genomics, is the field of research that examines why and how different social factors and processes affect the activity of the genome. Social genomics as a field is very young and was spurred by the scientific understanding that the expression of genes to their gene products, though not the DNA sequence itself, is affected by the external environment. Social genomics researchers have thus examined the role of social factors on the expression of individual genes, or more commonly, clusters of many genes.
Emotional eating, also known as stress eating and emotional overeating, is defined as the "propensity to eat in response to positive and negative emotions". While the term commonly refers to eating as a means of coping with negative emotions, it sometimes include eating for positive emotions, such as overeating when celebrating an event or to enhance an already good mood.