Cellular and humoral immunity, mood and exam stress: the influences of self-hypnosis and personality predictors

Gruzelier, John; Smith, Fiona; Nagy, Andrew; Henderson, D. C.

doi:10.1016/s0167-8760(01)00136-2

Cited by 83 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…Several clinical interventions have been evaluated for use with students experiencing exam stress. Those with positive findings include expressive writing (Beilock 2011), self-hypnosis (Gruzelier et al 2001), mindfulness (Shapiro, Schwartz and Bonner 1998), and yoga (Malathi and Damodaran 1999;Gopal et al 2011). These clinical interventions require qualified trainers and rely on student motivation to undergo training.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Randomized Cross-over Exploratory Study of the Effect of Visiting Therapy Dogs on College Student Stress Before Final Exams

et al. 2016

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This exploratory study investigated the effect of visiting therapy dogs on college-student perceived and physiological stress the week prior to final exams. Students (n = 78) were randomly assigned to order of a therapydog intervention and attention-control condition, each 15 minutes long. Students completed the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), a stress visual analog scale (SVAS), and provided saliva for measuring nerve growth factor (sNGF) and alpha amylase (sAA), prior to randomization. Saliva samples and SVAS were again collected after each condition. There was no effect of group order on demographics, PSS, or initial SVAS. Repeated measures models were used to analyze the complete data sets of 57 students. There were no significant differences in sAA between or within students completing the intervention and control conditions. sNGF was not subjected to analysis as most levels were undetectable. Significant differences in SVAS scores were found between the intervention and control condition, with large effect sizes. SVAS scores were lower following the intervention, regardless of condition order (intervention first, p = 0.0001, d = 1.87; intervention second, p = 0.0004, d = 1.63). No SVAS differences were found for the control condition. Based on these findings, campus events with visiting therapy dogs represent a costeffective, easily accessible activity to reduce perceived, but not physiological, stress for college students prior to final exams.Keywords: animal-assisted activities, exam stress, human-animal interaction, therapy dogs Offering students the opportunity to interact with friendly dogs during exam periods is gaining popularity at colleges and universities. Tufts University, Emory University Law School, Kent State University, Harvard Medical School, and Yale Law School are among those offering such opportunities (Turner 2012;Christensen 2013). While anecdotal accounts of the popularity and benefits of these dog visits are reported, no formal studies of efficacy have been published. Before advocating for dog visits to address exam-related stress in college students, we first need evidence that such activities are effective in reducing student stress.It is well known that exams are a major stressful experience for college students. Elevated exam stress has been associated with increased tension and depression (Gilbert et al. 1996), poorer academic performance (Ng, Koh and Chia 2003), and lower student expectations of their grades (Austin, Saklofske and Mastoras 2010). Exam stress has also been negatively associated with physiological indicators of stress and immune function. Preuß and colleagues (2010) used salivary cortisol to measure physiological stress responses in college students before and after taking written and oral exams. Cortisol concentrations were elevated before, but not after, written exams and were higher before and after oral exams. Based on their findings, the authors concluded that while written exams caused a mild anticipatory stress response, oral exams elicited a strong...

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confidence: 99%

A Randomized Cross-over Exploratory Study of the Effect of Visiting Therapy Dogs on College Student Stress Before Final Exams

et al. 2016

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“…However these changes were buffered in the group of students who learned and practiced self-hypnosis training before exam to relieve stress. In a similar study design, NK cells and T cytotoxic cells were reduced under the effect of exam stress and normalized with self hypnosis training that also increased T helper cell percentage (Gruzelier et al, 2001).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Chronic Mental Stress Induces Reversible Reduction of Natural Killer Cells and CD56<sup>dim </sup>Subpopulation

Ismail¹

2017

American Journal of Immunology

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Generally, studying to be a health care provider is a stressful and demanding field and the students have to face many stressors that may affect their general health status including the immune system. This work aimed at studying the effect of prolonged naturalistic life-stress exposure on the percentage of peripheral blood T-lymphocytes and Natural Killer (NK) cells in female laboratory medicine students. 52 peripheral blood samples in the last week of the final written exam (stress time point) and 27 samples after 12 weeks rest (control) were withdrawn and analyzed by flow cytometry. At the stress time point, there was a significant high T helper cells percentage with elevation of T helper/T cytotoxic ratio, P value <0.001. Also, significant low percentages of NK cells and CD56 dim together with high CD56 bright subpopoulations were detected, P value <0.001. Lymphocyte analysis of the subgroup that had an attach of common cold (34.6%) revealed significant reduction in the number of T cytotoxic and NK cells, P values 0.042 and 0.001 respectively. This study concluded that in humans, naturalistic chronic stress as expressed in academic exams has the potential to negatively affect the immune system, but normality is regained after sufficient stress relieve measures. Replication in larger and more diverse sample populations with inclusion of males for comparison is required, Also assessments of NK cell cytotoxicity and T helper cell subsets especially T regulatory cells are required for future studies.

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“…People with marked memory complaints have a low esteem of their own memory capacity, i.e. a lower memory-related self-efficacy (MSE) than people without memory complaints [5] .…”

Section: A Pilot Group Therapy For Functional Memory Disordermentioning

confidence: 99%

Hypnosis Upregulates the Expression of Immune-Related Genes in Lymphocytes

Kovács

Puskás

Juhász

et al. 2008

Psychother Psychosom

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Cellular and humoral immunity, mood and exam stress: the influences of self-hypnosis and personality predictors

Cited by 83 publications

References 61 publications

A Randomized Cross-over Exploratory Study of the Effect of Visiting Therapy Dogs on College Student Stress Before Final Exams

A Randomized Cross-over Exploratory Study of the Effect of Visiting Therapy Dogs on College Student Stress Before Final Exams

Chronic Mental Stress Induces Reversible Reduction of Natural Killer Cells and CD56<sup>dim </sup>Subpopulation

Hypnosis Upregulates the Expression of Immune-Related Genes in Lymphocytes

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