TY - JOUR
T1 - Marital status as a predictor of diurnal salivary cortisol levels and slopes in a community sample of healthy adults
AU - Chin, Brian
AU - Murphy, Michael L.M.
AU - Janicki-Deverts, Denise
AU - Cohen, Sheldon
N1 - Funding Information:
Preparation of this paper was supported by a grant from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (AT006694); the conduct of the studies was supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health (MH50429), National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (HL65111; HL65112), and National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (R01 AI066367); and secondary support was provided by a grant from the National Institutes of Health to the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center General Clinical Research Center (NCRR/GCRC 5M01 RR00056) and from the National Institutes of Health to the University of Pittsburgh Clinical and Translational Science Institute (UL1 RR024153 and UL1 RT000005); and supplemental support was provided by John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Socioeconomic Status & Health. We thank David Creswell and Brooke Feeney for their feedback on an earlier version of this manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2017/4/1
Y1 - 2017/4/1
N2 - Married people tend to be healthier than both the previously (bereaved, divorced, and separated) and never married, but the mechanisms through which this occurs remain unclear. To this end, research has increasingly focused on how psychological stress experienced by unmarried versus married individuals may differentially impact physiological systems related to health. One key system that is modulated by stress is the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, of which cortisol is a key hormonal product. Increased cortisol production and disruption of cortisol's daily rhythm have been linked to poorer health outcomes. This study examined the association between current marital status and these two indices of cortisol in a community sample of 572 healthy men and women aged 21–55. It also tested whether marriage buffers against the effect of stress (perceived stress by marital status interaction) on cortisol production. Participants provided salivary cortisol samples during waking hours on three nonconsecutive separate days to calculate diurnal cortisol levels and slopes. Married individuals had lower cortisol levels than either their never married or previously married counterparts. Differences in cortisol levels were due at least in part to currently married individuals having a more rapid decline in cortisol through the afternoon hours compared to individuals who were never married (but not those who were previously married). Furthermore, there was an interaction between perceived stress and marital status in predicting cortisol levels. Specifically, higher stress was associated with higher cortisol levels for previously married individuals but not for the married or never married. The results of this study support cortisol as one candidate mechanism accounting for the association of marital status and health.
AB - Married people tend to be healthier than both the previously (bereaved, divorced, and separated) and never married, but the mechanisms through which this occurs remain unclear. To this end, research has increasingly focused on how psychological stress experienced by unmarried versus married individuals may differentially impact physiological systems related to health. One key system that is modulated by stress is the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, of which cortisol is a key hormonal product. Increased cortisol production and disruption of cortisol's daily rhythm have been linked to poorer health outcomes. This study examined the association between current marital status and these two indices of cortisol in a community sample of 572 healthy men and women aged 21–55. It also tested whether marriage buffers against the effect of stress (perceived stress by marital status interaction) on cortisol production. Participants provided salivary cortisol samples during waking hours on three nonconsecutive separate days to calculate diurnal cortisol levels and slopes. Married individuals had lower cortisol levels than either their never married or previously married counterparts. Differences in cortisol levels were due at least in part to currently married individuals having a more rapid decline in cortisol through the afternoon hours compared to individuals who were never married (but not those who were previously married). Furthermore, there was an interaction between perceived stress and marital status in predicting cortisol levels. Specifically, higher stress was associated with higher cortisol levels for previously married individuals but not for the married or never married. The results of this study support cortisol as one candidate mechanism accounting for the association of marital status and health.
KW - Diurnal slopes
KW - Marital status
KW - Salivary cortisol
KW - Stress buffering
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85012245146&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2017.01.016
DO - 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2017.01.016
M3 - Article
C2 - 28171850
AN - SCOPUS:85012245146
SN - 0306-4530
VL - 78
SP - 68
EP - 75
JO - Psychoneuroendocrinology
JF - Psychoneuroendocrinology
ER -