title: Evolution of concepts of stress.
abstract: This essay describes the evolution of stress as a medical scientific idea. Claude Bernard, Walter B. Cannon and Hans Selye provided key founding concepts for the current view. Bernard introduced the idea of the internal environment bathing cells - the milieu intérieur - maintained by continual compensatory changes of bodily functions. Cannon coined the word, "homeostasis," referring to a set of acceptable ranges of values for internal variables. Cannon taught that threats to homeostasis evoke activation of the sympathoadrenal system as a functional unit. Selye defined stress as a state characterized by a uniform response pattern, regardless of the particular stressor, that could lead to long-term pathologic changes. "Allostasis" was introduced as a concept in recognition that there is no single ideal set of steady-state conditions in life; instead, setpoints and other response criteria change continuously. Stress is now viewed neither as a perturbation nor a stereotyped response pattern but as a condition characterized by a perceived discrepancy between information about a monitored variable and criteria for eliciting patterned effector responses. Different stressors elicit different patterns of activation of the sympathetic nervous, adrenomedullary hormonal, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical and other effectors, closing negative feedback loops. This systems concept of stress yields predictions that observation or experimentation can test and that are applicable to normal physiology and to a variety of acute and chronic disorders.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Neurocardiology Section, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, Bethesda, MD 20892-1620, USA. goldsteind@ninds.nih.gov
authors.forename: David S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Goldstein
authors.forename: Irwin J
authors.initials: IJ
authors.lastname: Kopin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001833:Body Temperature Regulation; D004837:Epinephrine / Q000097:blood; D005246:Feedback; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006706:Homeostasis / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D009638:Norepinephrine / Q000097:blood; D013312:Stress, Physiological / Q000266:history* / Q000503:physiopathology; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000503:physiopathology
chemical_list: D009638:Norepinephrine; D004837:Epinephrine