The effect of acute psychosocial stress on salivary cortisol and testosterone responses in men and women: The role of impulsivity

Abstract

Personality-like traits such as impulsivity may be associated with interindividual variation in endocrine function and in physiological reactivity to psychosocial stress. This study investigated the relationship between impulsivity, cortisol, and testosterone both in baseline conditions and in response to psychosocial stress in a mixed-sex sample of college students (mean age = 22.275, SD = 4.321). Half of our study participants (total n = 120, 60 male, 60 female) underwent a Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) (n = 60, 31 male, 29 female) and half were in a control condition (n = 60, 29 male, 31 female). All of them provided saliva samples to assess hormone levels at three-time points (i.e., “baseline”, “during”, and “after” either the TSST or control condition) and completed the Eysenck Impulsivity Questionnaire (EIQ). We found positive correlations between the global EIQ score, its dimension ‘venturesomeness’, and testosterone levels when data for males and females were analyzed together. We also found a negative correlation between ‘venturesomeness’ and cortisol changes. The EIQ dimension ‘impulsivity’ influenced cortisol changes in both sexes, whereas the global EIQ influenced testosterone changes only in females in the control condition. Our results highlight potential sex differences in the association between steroid hormones and various aspects of impulsivity and suggest limited effects of impulsivity dimensions on the regulation of cortisol and testosterone levels.