Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research (FNRS), Université catholique de Louvain, Department of Psychology, Place Cardinal Mercier 10, B-1348 Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium.
Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2010 Jun;35(5):752-7. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2009.11.003. Epub 2009 Dec 2.
The cortisol awakening response (CAR) is increasingly recognized as a potential biological marker of psychological and physical health status. Yet, the CAR literature is replete with contradictory results: both supposedly protective and vulnerability psychosocial factors have been associated with both increased and decreased CAR. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that the CAR flexibility would be a better indicator of psychological status than CAR magnitude. Forty-two men measures of happiness, perceived stress and neuroticism, and took saliva samples immediately on awakening, then at 15, 30, 45 and 60min post-awakening on three study days (i.e., Sunday, Monday and Tuesday). When considering the CAR magnitude, our effects perfectly reflect the inconsistencies previously observed in the literature (i.e., the main effects of the psychological predictors are not consistent with each other, and the effect of one predictor on a given day contradicts the effect of the same predictor on another day). However, considering the CAR flexibility leads to a fully consistent pattern: protective factors (i.e., high happiness, low stress, low neurotiscim) are associated with a flexible CAR (i.e., lower CAR during weekends compared to workdays) whereas vulnerability factors (i.e., low happiness, high stress, high neurotiscim) are associated with a stiff CAR (i.e., same magnitude during weekends and workdays). We conclude that considering the CAR flexibility (e.g., between weekends and workdays) rather than the traditional CAR magnitude might be a way to understand the apparent conflicts in the CAR literature.
皮质醇觉醒反应（CAR）越来越被认为是心理和身体健康状况的潜在生物学标志物。然而，CAR 文献中充满了相互矛盾的结果：据称具有保护作用和易感性的心理社会因素与 CAR 的增加和减少都有关。在这项研究中，我们检验了以下假设：即 CAR 的灵活性将比 CAR 的幅度更好地指示心理状态。42 名男性参与者测量了幸福感、感知压力和神经质，并在三个研究日（即周日、周一和周二）的早晨、15 分钟、30 分钟、45 分钟和 60 分钟后立即采集唾液样本。当考虑 CAR 的幅度时，我们的效果完全反映了文献中先前观察到的不一致性（即心理预测因子的主要效应彼此不一致，并且一个预测因子在某一天的影响与同一预测因子在另一天的影响相矛盾）。然而，当考虑 CAR 的灵活性时，会得到一个完全一致的模式：保护因素（即高幸福感、低压力、低神经质）与灵活的 CAR 相关（即周末的 CAR 比工作日低），而脆弱因素（即低幸福感、高压力、高神经质）与僵硬的 CAR 相关（即周末和工作日的 CAR 幅度相同）。我们得出结论，考虑 CAR 的灵活性（例如，周末和工作日之间）而不是传统的 CAR 幅度，可能是理解 CAR 文献中明显冲突的一种方法。
