ArticlePsychological science2022
Grief Symptoms Promote Inflammation During Acute Stress Among Bereaved Spouses.
Article in Psychological science, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 22 citations in OpenAlex.
- Grief-Related Chest Pain: A Review, Conceptual Analysis, and Integrative Model.Psychophysiology · 2026Pooled it
- Grief-Related Psychopathology from Complicated Grief to DSM-5-TR Prolonged Grief Disorder: A Systematic Review of Biochemical Findings.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Pooled it
- Stress-induced IL-6 response patterns amplify the link between daily negative affect and later depressive symptoms during bereavement.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2026Article
- Attachment Insecurity and Well-Being in Dementia Spousal Caregivers: The Moderating Role of Marital Satisfaction.Biopsychosocial science and medicine · 2026Article
- Prolonged grief disorder in later life: advancing our understanding of biopsychosocial mechanisms to guide future personalized interventions.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2026Review
- Living with what is lost: reframing emotional life with diabetes through an integrative perspective on loss and grief.Frontiers in clinical diabetes and healthcare · 2026Article
- Social isolation, but not partner separation, lowers hippocampal synaptosome mitochondrial respiration in female California mice (Peromyscus californicus).Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Article
- Heightened risk: Childhood trauma and anticipatory grief exacerbate the impact of loneliness on depressive symptoms and LPS-stimulated cytokines in dementia caregivers.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Article
- Spousal bereavement enhances proinflammatory cytokine production to acute, psychological stress.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2025Article
- The effects of social loss and isolation on partner odor investigation and dopamine and oxytocin receptor expression in female prairie voles.Neuropharmacology · 2025Article
- Development and evaluation of a Hospice Foundation of Taiwan Bereavement Assessment Scale: A psychometric properties test.Palliative & supportive care · 2025Article
- Health during Relationship Transitions: Policy Implications for Dating, New Parenthood, and Bereavement.Policy insights from the behavioral and brain sciences · 2024Article
- ICD-11 andThe Australian and New Zealand journal of psychiatry · 2024Article
- Somatic symptoms and insomnia among bereaved parents and siblings eight years after the Utøya terror attack.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
The death of a spouse is associated with maladaptive immune alterations; grief severity may exacerbate this link. We investigated whether high grief symptoms were associated with an amplified inflammatory response to subsequent stress among 111 recently bereaved older adults. Participants completed a standardized psychological stressor and underwent a blood draw before, 45 min after, and 2 hr after the stressor. Those experiencing high grief symptoms (i.e., scoring > 25 on the Inventory of Complicated Grief) experienced a 45% increase in interleukin-6 (IL-6; a proinflammatory cytokine) per hour, whereas those experiencing low grief symptoms demonstrated a 26% increase. In other words, high grief was related to a 19% increase in IL-6 per hour relative to low grief. The grief levels of recently bereaved people were associated with the rate of change in IL-6 following a subsequent stressor, above and beyond depressive symptoms. This is the first study to demonstrate that high grief symptoms promote inflammation following acute stress.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.