Information on the research studies currently being conducted in the Behavioral Immunology Laboratory can be found below.

Vaccination Immunity Project

Pittsburgh Cold Study

Acute Stress and Biological Aging

Pitt Air Study

Connections to Coping Study

Pediatric Asthma Intervention Study

Sibling Study

Vaccination Immunity Project (VIP Study)

The Vaccination Immunity Project is a 5-year study that began in January 2004 & is funded by the National Institute of Nursing Research.  The purpose of the study is to examine whether psychological stress influences ability to mount an immune response to hepatitis B vaccination. There are now a number of studies that show that stress is associated with increased risk of catching a cold or the flu, but it remains unclear how stress influences risk of infection. This study is designed to explore pathways that could account for this relationship, including the possibility that stress influences the body’s ability to mount a protective immune response and/or leads to changes in health behaviors such as eating, sleeping, and exercising that influence the ability of the immune system to respond. Both of these possibilities could place a person at increased risk of infection at times of stress.

In this research study, participants are asked to come in for 14 visits over the course of 20 months.  During these visits, we ask participants about their current levels of psychological stress and their health behaviors, and we measure their immune responses to a laboratory task designed to mimic a minor daily hassle. All participants are then given the standard series of three hepatitis B vaccinations and their responses to this vaccination are measured twice during the following 12 months.

The study is closed to participant enrollment and we are tracking current participants’ progress through the project.   Currently, we are analyzing the data collected from participants and are writing manuscripts for journal submission. 

Pittsburgh Cold Study

The Cold Study is a 5-year project and is funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.  It is based at Carnegie Mellon University under the direction of Sheldon Cohen, PhD.   This prospective study is designed to learn more about how psychological factors such as social support and stress, behaviors such as exercise and smoking, and genetics influence the body’s resistance to the common cold.  An upper respiratory infectious disease paradigm is used as a model to investigate the potential influence of psychosocial factors on infection, viral-induced inflammatory processes and disease expression. 

In this study, participants are evaluated for various psychological & biological factors that could impact immune response.  Participants are then inoculated with a virus that causes the common cold while quarantined for close examination of infection and illness expression.  Participants are also asked to complete an acute stress reactivity session on two occasions to evaluate their cardiovascular and cortisol responses to a laboratory challenge task.  These reactivity sessions take place in our psycho-physiology laboratory in Old Engineering Hall.

This study began in May 2007 and is on going.

Acute Stress and Biological Aging Study (ASBA)

During the past century, life expectancy at birth has increased substantially. A cost of this increase in longevity is a greater incidence of diseases of aging. It is possible that age-related increases in morbidity and mortality reflect the progression of disease processes that take decades to reach clinical manifestation. Alternatively chronic diseases may be consequences of biological aging, or the progressive decline in physiologic ability to meet environmental demands. Of recent interest is determining why some individuals appear to age more quickly, and thus succumb to chronic diseases of aging earlier than others. One factor that has been proposed to contribute to vulnerability to a range of age-related chronic diseases is psychosocial and/or environmental stress. Stress has been linked with increased all-cause morbidity and mortality and has been hypothesized to contribute to overall aging of the organism. Evidence from observational studies in humans supports a link between chronic psychosocial stress and decreased telomere length and telomerase activity, both molecular level markers of cellular aging. Chronic psychosocial stress also has been associated with increased oxidative stress, which may be an underlying cause of many aspects of aging. Findings from animal research suggest that stress is reliably associated with enhanced macrophage function, which may provide a pathway to increased oxidative stress and thus cellular aging. To date, no study has reported the effects of an acute laboratory stressor on telomerase activity, oxidative stress, or macrophage function in humans.

The primary goal of the proposed study is to expand upon existing research on chronic stress and biological aging by examining whether exposure to acute laboratory stress is associated with changes in markers of biological aging, telomerase activity, DNA damage, and oxidized lipids and a related immunological factor, macrophage function. We hypothesize that exposure to an acute laboratory stressor will be associated with decreased telomerase activity, increased oxidized lipid and DNA damage levels and increased macrophage function.

This study is scheduled to start recruiting participants in January 2008.

Pitt Air Study

Emerging evidence indicates that the autonomic nervous system (ANS) plays an important role in regulating the immune system.  For instance, studies in both animals and human suggest that  low levels of parasympathetic activity can increase the magnitude of the inflammatory response, characterized by elevated production of the pro-inflammatory cytokines.  Elevated levels pro-inflammatory cytokines are  associated with incidence and progression of a number of diseases, including cardiovascular disease and rheumatoid arthritis.  

The goal of the PITT AIR STUDY is to explore whether paced deep breathing, an intervention designed to increase parasympathetic activity, results in a decrease in pro-inflammatory cytokine production in response to an in vitro inflammatory challenge. To this end, we will recruit sixty healthy volunteers, between the ages of 18-40, to participate in a 1 hour laboratory session.  Following a 20 minute resting baseline period, participants will be randomly assigned to either a 20 minute resting control condition (n=20) or a paced deep breathing (6 breaths/minute) intervention (n=40). Parasympathetic activity, as measured using  heart rate variability, will be assessed  throughout the baseline and task periods. Blood samples will be obtained toward the end of both periods for determination of immune reactivity.  

We hypothesize that those in the paced breathing intervention will show an increase in parasympathetic activity and a related decrease in pro-inflammatory cytokine production when compared to those in the resting control condition.  It is our hope that findings from this study may lead to the development of non-invasive interventions that may be of benefit in the clinical management of chronic inflammatory conditions.

This study began recruiting participants during fall 2007 and is ongoing. 

Pediatric Asthma Intervention Study

Research has shown that stress can precipitate or exacerbate asthma attacks in some children. We have developed a stress and coping intervention for children ages 8 to 12 who have been diagnosed with asthma. During this intervention, child participants meet with a clinician one-on-one for 6 sessions. They learn about the ways in which stress can make asthma worse, and they learn ways to manage stress. This includes learning to challenge their negative thoughts, “ride the waves” of emotions, and develop a coping plan for dealing with asthma symptoms. In addition, children engage in biofeedback-assisted relaxation exercises. After the 6 intervention sessions, we measure whether or not children who receive the intervention show improvements in their perceptions of stress and distress, as well as their lung function and frequency of asthma symptoms.

Currently, we are assessing the feasibility of implementing this intervention in an elementary school in Pittsburgh.