Stress and the Brain

Catalog description

Covers the fundamentals of stress and brain interactions. Presents a foundation from a historical perspective, then the basics of an organism's stress response, including the activation of the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis. The stress response is highly conserved and allows organisms to respond and adapt to their environment. A highly effective and robust stress response facilitates adaptation and behavioral flexibility. However, a maladaptive stress response can produce detrimental outcomes. The ultimate goal is to understand the dynamic and reciprocal processes by which the stress response and brain interact to produce behavioral flexibility and resilience or detrimental outcomes.