The Mental Burden of Immunoperception Publisher



Saghazadeh A^{1, 2} ; Hafizi S³ ; Rezaei N^{4, 5, 6} Show Affiliations
Source: Biophysics and Neurophysiology of the Sixth Sense Published:2019

Abstract

Emotion regulation (ER) embodies the very essence of the self-regulation setting, albeit along with control of attention and physiological responses to stimulation. Mapping the last two decades clarifies the more than threefold increased number of publications considering the concept of ER during 2004-2013 compared with 1994-2003. Along with this intense and still increasing concentration on the ER concept, emotion dysregulation (EDR) has been closely correlated with a constellation of mental disorders such as depression, anxiety, and substance abuse. Some of these disorders, especially anxiety and depression, are highly likely to affect medical populations, e.g., patients with HIV, cancer, and diabetes or patients on end-stage diseases. In light of this progress, two reciprocal interactions appear, ER-psychological status/mental diseases and ER-physiological status/physical diseases, and accordingly, EDR can be clearly considered as the common core component between mental and physical conditions. In this chapter, we present evidence that this is owing to the contribution of the immune system, leading to postulate a model consisting of two connecting feedback loops (ER-psychological status and ER-physiological status) with the common background of the immune system, named the Immunoemotional Regulatory System (IMMERS). Animal studies reveal that immune challenges such as that elicited by endotoxins, enterotoxins, infections, and autoimmune models that induce the secretion of cytokines and their receptors (such as TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, IL-10, soluble TNF receptors, and IL-1Ra) confront animals with serious emotionalityrelated behavioral abnormalities (such as anxiety-and depressive-like behaviors and altered fear responses). Interestingly, these neurobehavioral manifestations can be attenuated by immunomodulatory treatments such as anti-TNF. Human studies demonstrate that challenging of the immune system early in the development can predispose individuals to EDR-related disorders later during the adulthood. In addition, these studies have established close associations between concentrations of inflammation-related markers (especially IL-6) with affective/ emotional states, emotional functioning, and ER-related subscales (such as anxiety, stress, and depressive symptoms) in both clinical settings (anxiety, major depressive disorder, and hemodialysis) and healthy populations dealing with various real-life challenges (e.g., traumatic injuries, perceived discrimination, playing in the orchestra, and delivering preterm). It is followed by an account of numerous psychological states including anxiety, positive and negative affect, aggression, loneliness, stress, worry, well-being, socioeconomic status, shame, and perceived discrimination that already have been associated with changes in ER and immune response. The fact that the etiology of many mental conditions entails two complex processes, i.e., emotion regulation and immune regulation, has an important implication. It is that the value of immunoemotion regulation to humans and its potential clinical benefits should be reasonable to both the human and the medical society. Under these regulations, patients try to regulate their own emotions and physicians help them using both emotion regulation care services and medications used to regulate immune responses. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019.