Stress

While stress can be helpful during certain activities like competitive sports or public speaking, chronic stress experienced over long periods of time has undesirable effects on brain size, structure, and function. Too much stress can cause the deterioration of electric signals in the hippocampus (affecting learning, memories, and stress control) and cause shrinking of the prefrontal cortex (affecting concentration, decision-making, judgement, and social interaction) (How stress affects your brain, 2015).

In a longitudinal study that examined the experience and behavior of STEM and medical students, researchers found that STEM students showed a substantial risk for burnout, and a decrease in healthy study-related behavior after three years in their college programs. These findings suggest a need for contextual health promotion and reduction of study-related stress to support student health and performance (Voltmer et al., 2019). Read more...