Cortisol
nmol/L
The main glucocorticoid of the HPA axis. It rises with threat, metabolic load, sleep loss, and social evaluation.
Calling it the stress hormone oversimplifies. It indexes HPA activation under social-evaluative threat, sleep loss, illness, and circadian phase. In the dual-hormone hypothesis it is the brake: high cortisol is proposed to block or reverse testosterone's link to status-seeking.
Also called glucocorticoid, HPA.
Connected relationships
Observational · Moderate
Cortisol→Leadership effectiveness
Higher Cortisol moves Leadership effectiveness only in some conditions. Read the mechanism.
High cortisol is the condition under which 'high T = leader' fails. The internet quote drops this term.
Randomized trial · Contested
Ashwagandha→Cortisol
Higher Ashwagandha decreases Cortisol.
Choudhary 2017 found that 300 mg of ashwagandha root extract twice a day for eight weeks lowered morning serum cortisol versus placebo in 52 overweight adults under chronic stress (13.41 versus 15.44 μg per deciliter at week 8, P=0.0132). Cortisol was a secondary endpoint in a weight-and-craving trial.
Observational · Low
Job strain→Cortisol
Higher Job strain moves Cortisol only in some conditions. Read the mechanism.
Hair cortisol ran higher with effort-reward imbalance among 81 high-workload workers, and morning saliva ran 21.7 percent higher in 48 high-strain teachers, but Karasek job strain tracked a lower diurnal cortisol area in 254 matched MESA adults. Nobody assigned the job.
Randomized trial · High confidence
Sleep duration and regularity→Cortisol
Higher Sleep duration and regularity decreases Cortisol.
Six 4-hour nights raised evening cortisol in eleven young men. Four nights of 5-to-9-hour beds in eighty-eight adolescents did not move evening or morning saliva cortisol.
Cases
Sources
- P. H. Mehta et al. (2010). Testosterone and cortisol jointly regulate dominance: Evidence for a dual-hormone hypothesis
- J. M. Carré et al. (2015). Social neuroendocrinology of human aggression: Examining the role of competition-induced testosterone dynamics
- D Choudhary et al. (2017). Body Weight Management in Adults Under Chronic Stress Through Treatment With Ashwagandha Root Extract: A Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Trial.
- L van der Meij et al. (2018). Hair cortisol and work stress: Importance of workload and stress model (JDCS or ERI).
- A Steptoe et al. (2000). Job strain and anger expression predict early morning elevations in salivary cortisol.
- RM Herr et al. (2018). Associations of work stress with hair cortisol concentrations - initial findings from a prospective study.
- KE Rudolph et al. (2016). Job Strain and the Cortisol Diurnal Cycle in MESA: Accounting for Between- and Within-Day Variability.
- K. Spiegel et al. (1999). Impact of sleep debt on metabolic and endocrine function
- U Voderholzer et al. (2012). The impact of increasing sleep restriction on cortisol and daytime sleepiness in adolescents.