Stress and Your Body

Course Overview

Discover how stress is negatively affecting your health and learn new strategies to minimize its impact in this course taught by a MacArthur “Genius.”

Course No. 1585

This 24-lecture course with renowned neurobiologist Professor Sapolsky reveals:

• Why modern humans suffer chronic stress while animals don’t
• How stress damages every major body system
• The biological links between stress and depression/anxiety
• Science-backed techniques to manage daily stressors
  Using primate studies and clinical research to explain our stress response system.

Video Lectures

Module 1: Stress Fundamentals

1. Why Don’t Zebras Get Ulcers? Why Do We? (31 min)
   Introduction to stress science and human-animal differences.
2. The Nuts and Bolts of the Stress-Response (31 min)
   Nervous system and hormonal reactions to stress.

Module 2: Physical Impacts

3. Stress and Your Heart (31 min)
   How chronic stress damages cardiovascular health.
4. Stress, Metabolism, and Liquidating Your Assets (31 min)
   Stress-induced diabetes and energy mismanagement.
5. Stress, Overeating, and Your Digestive Tract (31 min)
   IBS, ulcers, and stress-related eating patterns.

Module 3: Development & Reproduction

6. Stress and Growth: Echoes from the Womb (31 min)
   Prenatal stress effects and parenting styles.
7. Stress, Growth, and Child Development (31 min)
   Stress dwarfism and the importance of nurturing.
8. Stress and Female Reproduction (30 min)
   Fertility, miscarriages, and IVF challenges.
9. Stress and Male Reproduction (32 min)
   Erectile dysfunction and testosterone changes.

Module 4: Immunity & Cognition

10. Stress and Your Immune System (31 min)
    Autoimmune flare-ups and infection vulnerability.
11. Stress and Cancer (31 min)
    Examining controversial stress-cancer links.
12. Stress and Pain (29 min)
    Bidirectional relationship between stress/pain.
13. Stress, Learning, and Memory (29 min)
    How stress affects hippocampus and memory.

Module 5: Psychological Effects

14. Stress, Judgment, and Impulse Control (31 min)
    Frontal cortex impairment from chronic stress.
15. Stress, Sleep, and Lack of Sleep (31 min)
    Disrupted sleep cycles and restoration.
16. Stress and Aging (31 min)
    Accelerated aging from lifetime stress exposure.

Module 6: Stress Management

17. Understanding Psychological Stress (30 min)
    Outlets, social support, and predictability.
18. Psychological Modulators of Stress (30 min)
    Control and interpretation factors.
19. Stress and the Biology of Depression (31 min)
    Neurochemical links between stress and depression.
20. Stress and the Psychology of Depression (30 min)
    Integrating biological/psychological models.

Module 7: Behavioral Impacts

21. Anxiety, Hostility, Repression, and Reward (31 min)
    Stress-induced personality changes.
22. Stress, Health, and Low Social Status (30 min)
    Socioeconomic factors in stress vulnerability.

Module 8: Coping Strategies

23. Stress Management: Clues to Success? (30 min)
    Predictors of resilient aging.
24. Stress Management: Approaches and Cautions (32 min)
    Exercise, meditation, and social support techniques.