Abstract
The use of saliva as an alternative specimen for the determination of various stress hormones has gained increasing attention, because saliva sampling has the advantage that it is making multiple sampling and stress free. We examined the effects of psychological stressor and soother on the levels of salivary cortisol and β-endorphin as the indexes of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortex activity, and amylase as the index of sympatho-adrenomedullary activity. The subjects were 83 healthy volunteers (23.3 yrs). State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) was used to assess the responsibility to anxiety. The video of corneal transplant surgery (stressful video) and scenic beauty (soothing video) were served for 15 min. The whole saliva was collected at every 3 min. The amylase level was significantly increased just after the beginning of stressful video viewing (p<0.01) and immediately returned to the pre-stress level just after the video end. The cortisol and β-endorphin levels were increased later than the amylase, and returned to the pre-stress level later 3-12 min than that of amylase. Soothing video viewing significantly decreased in amylase level, and increased in β-endorphin level (p<0.05), but did not affected on the cortisol level. Correlation between the amylase level and the STAI score was highly significant (r = 0. 535, p<0, 01). However, the cortisol and β-endorphin levels did not correlate to STAI score. It is suggested that the salivary amylase is a useful tool of psychological stress of young adult, and is more sensitive and specific than cortisol and β-endorphin measurements. [Jpn J Physiol 54 Suppl:S218 (2004)]
