Kirschbaum C, Wolf O T, May M, Wippich W, Hellhammer D H
Center for Psychobiological and Psychosomatic Research, University of Trier, Germany.
Life Sci. 1996;58(17):1475-83. doi: 10.1016/0024-3205(96)00118-x.
Two studies investigated the association between cortisol levels and memory performance in healthy adults. In a first study, 13 subjects were exposed to a brief psychosocial laboratory stress ("Trier Social Stress Test") with a subsequent test of declarative memory performance. Results indicated a significant negative relationship between stress-induced cortisol levels and performance in the memory task, i.e. subjects with high cortisol response to the stressor showed poorer memory performance. In a second experiment it was investigated if cortisol, alone, i.e. independent of psychological stress, would also impair memory function. In this study, 40 healthy subjects received either 10 mg cortisol or placebo orally. One hour later they were tested for procedural and declarative memory and spatial thinking. Subjects who received cortisol showed impaired performance in the declarative memory and spatial thinking tasks but not in the procedural memory task. From these results we conclude that in healthy adults elevated free cortisol levels are associated with impaired memory function.
两项研究调查了健康成年人皮质醇水平与记忆表现之间的关联。在第一项研究中，13名受试者经历了短暂的心理社会实验室应激（“特里尔社会应激测试”），随后进行了陈述性记忆表现测试。结果表明，应激诱导的皮质醇水平与记忆任务表现之间存在显著的负相关关系，即对应激源皮质醇反应高的受试者记忆表现较差。在第二项实验中，研究了单独的皮质醇，即独立于心理应激之外，是否也会损害记忆功能。在这项研究中，40名健康受试者口服10毫克皮质醇或安慰剂。一小时后，对他们进行程序记忆、陈述性记忆和空间思维测试。接受皮质醇的受试者在陈述性记忆和空间思维任务中表现受损，但在程序记忆任务中未受损。从这些结果我们得出结论，在健康成年人中，游离皮质醇水平升高与记忆功能受损有关。
