Psychoneuroendocrinology (November 2014) is publishing a fascinating paper authored by Sarah Lupis, Michelle Lerman and Jutta Wolf titled Anger responses to psychosocial stress predict heart rate and cortisol stress responses in men but not women.

People can experience a wide range of emotions when under stress, including feelings of anger and fear. In recent years researchers have sought to understand how these emotion stress responses are linked to biological stress responses. In particular, some evidence suggests that anger and fear may be linked to cardiovascular changes in differential ways. It is less clear, however, how emotions during stress may predict increases in levels of the stress hormone cortisol. These deficits in our understanding are partly due to the methodological difficulties in measuring emotion in the context of stress. Much prior research has relied solely on retrospective self-report (after the stress has passed, a questionnaire asks a study participant to reflect on how he felt in the moment of stress). By this time, the participant may have forgotten how he felt, or may already be utilizing coping strategies to process those emotions. In addition, he may not feel comfortable reporting how the stressor made him feel, leading to less-than-honest responses. Unsurprisingly, prior research has not shown consistent links between these self-report measures and biological stress responses. In the current study, we therefore added facial coding of emotion expression to assess emotions occurring during stress. Our aim was to determine how expressions of anger and fear were linked to heart rate and cortisol stress responses.

We recruited 32 healthy Brandeis students and exposed them to a brief psychosocial stressor. A certified coder assessed facial expressions shown during the stressful situation. Heart rate and cortisol levels were measured throughout. After the stressor, the participants also self-reported how they felt during the stressor. A first notable finding showed that what participants self-reported feeling and the expressions they actually showed did not correlate. With regards to self-report, men who reported feeling fear showed blunted cortisol stress responses. Consistent with prior research, self-report was otherwise not associated with heart rate or cortisol stress responses. When looking at facial expressions, a consistent pattern appeared: men who showed more anger during the stressful situation also showed exaggerated heart rate and cortisol stress responses. For women, neither anger nor fear were linked to biological stress responses (see Figure).

Our findings first emphasize the importance of assessing emotion using multiple means. In this case, facial expressions revealed an emotion-stress link for males that would not be apparent using self-report alone. Facial coding may thus be a useful addition to current stress paradigms. Further, if men who react with anger in stressful situations do respond with exaggerated stress responses, it could have important down-stream health effects. Exaggerated, prolonged, or dysfunctional stress responses could, over time, lead to changes in basal stress systems. This kind of ‘allostatic load’ is associated with negative health outcomes including diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Anger and fear do not seem to drive these responses in females, and further study is needed to determine if similar relationships exist for a different set of emotions, perhaps self-conscious emotions like shame. By better understanding these relationships, more healthful ways of coping with stress can be developed, which is particularly important given that for many, stress has become an unavoidable part of daily life.