An oral presentation causes stress and memory impairments

Merz, Christian J.; Hagedorn, Bianca; Wolf, Oliver T.

doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2019.02.010

Cited by 22 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 50 publications

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“…This was extended in experiment 4, where we also found no significant effect of stress immediately before retrieval. This finding is in line with some previous psychosocial stress studies suggesting minimal impact of stress immediately before retrieval on episodic memory (Beckner et al., 2006; Schoofs & Wolf, 2009), but differs from others suggesting psychosocial stress immediately before retrieval leads to impairments in episodic memory (Kuhlmann et al., 2005; Merz et al., 2019).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

The effects of psychosocial stress on item, cued‐pair and emotional memory

McManus

Talmi

Haroon

et al. 2021

Eur J of Neuroscience

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Physical stress, such as from the cold‐pressor test, has been robustly associated with altered memory retrieval, but it is less clear whether the same happens following psychosocial stress. Studies using psychosocial stressors report mixed effects on memory, leading to uncertainty about the common cognitive impact of both forms of stress. The current study uses a series of four carefully designed experiments, each differing by only a single critical factor to determine the effects of psychosocial stress on specific aspects of episodic memory. In three experiments, we induced psychosocial stress after participants encoded words, then assessed retrieval of those words after a prolonged delay. These experiments found no effect of post‐encoding stress on recognition of neutral words or cued recall of word‐pairs, but a small effect on recollection of semantically related words. There were, however, positive relationships within the stress group between measures of stress (cortisol in experiment 1 and self‐reported‐anxiety in experiment 3) and recollection of single word stimuli. In the fourth experiment, we found that psychosocial stress immediately before retrieval did not influence word recognition. Recollection, particularly for semantically related stimuli, may therefore be more susceptible to the effects of psychosocial stress, and future studies can assess how this relates to other forms of stress. Overall, our findings suggest that the effects of psychosocial stress on episodic memory may be more subtle than expected, warranting further exploration in larger studies.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

The effects of psychosocial stress on item, cued‐pair and emotional memory

McManus

Talmi

Haroon

et al. 2021

Eur J of Neuroscience

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show abstract

“…Our results have implications for everyday life situations since increases in glucocorticoids have been shown to impair memory retrieval and executive functioning [ 44 – 47 ]. Memory traces show impaired retrieval under higher cortisol levels, especially if they have a negative valence [ 48 – 50 ]. Since everyday situations like an upcoming examination are associated with a pronounced cortisol increase [ 51 ], it is important to consider potential buffers against the negative effects of cortisol secretion on memory retrieval.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Romantic partner embraces reduce cortisol release after acute stress induction in women but not in men

et al. 2022

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Stress is omnipresent in our everyday lives. It is therefore critical to identify potential stress-buffering behaviors that can help to prevent the negative effects of acute stress in daily life. Massages, a form of social touch, are an effective buffer against both the endocrinological and sympathetic stress response in women. However, for other forms of social touch, potential stress-buffering effects have not been investigated in detail. Furthermore, the possible stress-buffering effects of social touch on men have not been researched so far. The present study focused on embracing, one of the most common forms of social touch across many cultures. We used a short-term embrace between romantic partners as a social touch intervention prior to the induction of acute stress via the Socially Evaluated Cold Pressor Test. Women who embraced their partner prior to being stressed showed a reduced cortisol response compared to a control group in which no embrace occurred. No stress-buffering effect could be observed in men. No differences between the embrace and control group were observed regarding sympathetic nervous system activation measured via blood pressure or subjective affect ratings. These findings suggest that in women, short-term embraces prior to stressful social situations such as examinations or stressful interviews can reduce the cortisol response in that situation.

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“…Our results have implications for everyday life situations since increases in glucocorticoids have been shown to impair memory retrieval and executive functioning [44][45][46][47]. Memory traces show impaired retrieval under higher cortisol levels, especially if they have a negative valence [48][49][50]. Since everyday situations like an upcoming examination are associated with a pronounced cortisol increase [51], it is important to consider potential buffers against the negative effects of cortisol secretion on memory retrieval.…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 77%

Romantic partner embraces reduce cortisol release after acute stress induction in women but not in men

Berretz¹,

Cebula²,

Bm³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Stress is omnipresent in our everyday lives. It is therefore critical to identify potential stress-buffering behaviors that can help to prevent the negative effects of acute stress in daily life. Massages, a form of social touch, are an effective buffer against both the endocrinological and sympathetic stress response in women. However, for other forms of social touch, potential stress-buffering effects have not been investigated in detail. Furthermore, the possible stress-buffering effects of social touch on men have not been investigated so far. The present study focused on embracing, one of the most common forms of social touch across many cultures. We used a short-term embrace between romantic partners as a social touch intervention prior to the induction of acute stress via the Socially Evaluated Cold Pressor Test. Women who embraced their partner prior to being stressed showed a reduced cortisol response compared to a control group in which no embrace occurred. No stress-buffering effect could be observed in men. No differences between the embrace and control group were observed regarding sympathetic nervous system activation measured via blood pressure. These findings suggest that in females, short-term embraces prior to stressful social situations such as examinations or stress interviews can reduce the cortisol response in that situation

show abstract

An oral presentation causes stress and memory impairments

Cited by 22 publications

References 50 publications

The effects of psychosocial stress on item, cued‐pair and emotional memory

The effects of psychosocial stress on item, cued‐pair and emotional memory

Romantic partner embraces reduce cortisol release after acute stress induction in women but not in men

Romantic partner embraces reduce cortisol release after acute stress induction in women but not in men

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