Perceived Stress and Cytokine Production

The report on “Perceived Stress and Cytokine Production” is very interesting (Sribanditmongkol, Neal, Patrick, Szalacha, & McCarthy, 2014). Sribanditmongkol et al. (2014) found “a negative relationship between Perceived Stress Scale and glucocorticoid sensitivity for vaccine-stimulated production of IL-1β, IL-6, and TNF-α.” In fact, the important consideration is on the biological process corresponding to the present finding. Stress might have effect on neurotransmitter, and this might be a clue for alteration of cytokine (Müller, 2014). Nevertheless, the response to the vaccination in the present study can be due to other confounding factors such as underlying genetic and environmental factors. At least, Sribanditmongkol et al. did not control the confounding factor, and the stress in each subject might be different. Finally, the Perceived Stress Scale has to be adjusted for each specific setting before using to get the most sensitive tool for stress monitoring (Andreou et al., 2011; Eklund, Bäckström, & Tuvesson, 2014).