ACUTE STRESS

ScienceDaily (July 23, 2009)
The Author
Wenhua Liu, Ph.D, Jain Feng, Ph.D from University of Buffalo
Summarized by Meksianis Ndii

The authors claimed that acute stress can improve learning and memory. Research conducted by researchers for University of Buffalo concluded that corticosterone hormone plays an important role in improving learning and memory. This is because this hormone curbs learning and emotion.


There are two procedures that they used in this research: first, they examined the effects of stress on working memory and second, they determined the role of hormone corticosterone in refining memory. In the first procedure, some rodents, as an animal model, were made stressed by forcing them to swim and the other was not, after that, rodents were put at the maze. Result showed that the stressed rodents made fewer mistake when they went through the maze compared to the other one. In the second stage, researchers injected medical compound to some rodents to block the corticosterone pathway. The result revealed that rodent group which were injected medical compound could not act better that the other one.


Glossary
Corticosterone : cortisol in humans
Rodents :belonging or pertaining to the gnawing or nibbling mammals of the order Rodentia, including the mice, squirrels, beavers, etc.
Maze : a system of paths separated by walls or hedges build in a park or garden. It is designed so it is difficult to find ways through