Psychiatric News (12/2) reported, “Older men may be more vulnerable to the negative effects of stress on cognition compared with older women,” researchers concluded after analyzing “data from 274 community-dwelling adults aged 52 to 91 years…who participated in the UCSF Memory and Aging Center’s Longitudinal Brain Aging Study.” The study team posited that “the higher risk in older men may be because they experience greater increases in the inflammatory biomarker interleukin-6 (IL-6) in response to prolonged stress compared with older women.” The findings were published online Nov. 23 ahead of print in the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.

Related Links:

— “Prolonged Stress Linked to Cognitive Decline in Older Men, But Not Older Women, Psychiatric News,December 2, 2022

The New York Times (12/2, Friedman) reported, “Americans are five times more likely to say their stress level increases rather than decreases during the holidays,” And while such “higher stress levels aren’t only caused by a lack of physical activity, the lethargy certainly doesn’t help, said” Rebecca Brendel, MD, JD, “President of the American Psychiatric Association and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard University Medical School.” Because “exercise can be a key way to combat the stress of the season,” the article provided “easy fitness strategies” to help people keep their spirits up.

Related Links:

— “Stressed During the Holidays? There’s an Exercise for That. “Danielle Friedman, The New York Times, December 2, 2022

According to the Washington Post (12/5, A1, St. George, Strauss), across the US, “adolescent depression and anxiety – already at crisis levels before the pandemic – have surged amid the isolation, disruption and hardship of” the COVID-19 pandemic. However, “even as federal coronavirus relief money has helped schools step up their efforts to aid students, they also have come up short,” and it still remains “unclear how much money is going to mental health, how long efforts will last or if they truly reach those who struggle most.”

Related Links:

— “The Washington Post (requires login and subscription)

Healio (12/1, Downey) reports, “Childhood poverty was associated with increases in externalizing problems,” such as “aggression and hyperactivity,” but “not internalizing” (i.e., depression, anxiety), “over time in early adolescence,” investigators concluded in a study that included 7,569 children, 1,042 of whom “lived below the poverty threshold.” The findings were published online in JAMA Network Open.

Related Links:

— “Poverty linked to externalizing problems in early adolescence “Ken Downey Jr., Healio, December 1, 2022

The Washington Post (12/1, Reynolds Lewis) reports, “The stress of pandemic lockdowns prematurely aged the brains of teenagers by at least three years and in ways similar to changes observed in children who have faced chronic stress and adversity,” according to a study published in Biological Psychiatry: Global Open Science. Researchers compared “MRI scans of a group of 128 children, half taken before and half at the end of the first year of the pandemic” and “found growth in the hippocampus and amygdala, brain areas that respectively control access to some memories and help regulate fear, stress and other emotions.” Researchers “also found thinning of the tissues in the cortex, which is involved in executive functioning.”

Related Links:

— “The Washington Post (requires login and subscription)