Welcome! Thanks for listening to Check Engine Light Podcast. Each week I read(ish) and editorialize my article from the previous week.
This podcast is an audio version of my article from 08/15/2025.
B.O.L.O.: The Cost Staying Ready
References:
Bar-Haim Y, Lamy D, Pergamin L, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, van IJzendoorn MH. Threat related attentional bias in anxious individuals: a meta analytic study. Psychological Bulletin. 2007;133(1):1–24.
McEwen (2000) — Allostasis and Allostatic Load (Neuropsychopharmacology)
Defines allostasis as the brain-led process of maintaining stability through change, and allostatic load as the cumulative wear from repeated or prolonged stress responses across autonomic, endocrine, and immune systems. Links dysregulated stress biology to mood, sleep, and brain structural change. PubMedNature
McEwen & Stellar (1993) — Stress and the Individual (Arch Intern Med)
Introduces the term allostatic load and explains how chronic or repeated activation of stress mediators, even for everyday challenges, exacts a long-term physiological cost. Establishes the time dimension of load accumulation. PubMed
McEwen (1998) — Stress, Adaptation, and Disease: Allostasis and Allostatic Load (Ann N Y Acad Sci)
Expands the allostasis model and details common biomarkers and pathways (neuroendocrine, immune) through which chronic stress leads to disease. Useful as a quick map of the “cost accounting” of stress. PubMed
Sara SJ, Bouret S. Orienting and reorienting: the locus coeruleus mediates cognition through arousal. Neuron. 2012;76(1):130–141.
