Stress and Life Expectancy: How Does One Impact the Other?

We all face stress now and then, whether you’re rushing to an important meeting or dealing with the fallout from an unexpected flat tire. Stress is part of life, but how much is too much?

While no concrete amount of stress guarantees you’ll experience a shorter lifespan, prolonged stress (also known as chronic stress) can impact your health, which naturally affects longevity. While it’s impossible to predict exactly how many years stress might take away, its effects depend on factors like your lifestyle and genetics.

3 Ways Chronic Stress Can Impact Your Life Expectancy

Everyone experiences acute stress: those brief moments when something stressful occurs, resulting in an elevated heart rate or sweaty palms. When these feelings persist for weeks or longer, they turn into chronic stress.

Prolonged stress leads to the continuous release of cortisol, a stress hormone. In small doses, cortisol helps the body handle challenges, like quick decision-making in dangerous or stressful situations. However, long-term elevated cortisol can harm your health, contributing to the following conditions that could reduce your life expectancy.

#1 Cardiovascular Health Issues

Chronic stress, and therefore extended elevated cortisol levels, can raise your blood pressure, contribute to inflammation and damage your blood vessels. With a compromised cardiovascular system, you’re more prone to diseases such as:

  • Atherosclerosis
    Continued stress can cause biological changes that lead to atherosclerosis, a condition that occurs when plaque builds up in your artery walls. When this happens, it’s harder for blood to flow through your body, which can lead to potentially life-threatening conditions such as a heart attack or stroke.
  • Hypertension
    Hypertension occurs when your blood pressure is too high. Normal blood pressure is around 120/80 mmHg, whereas hypertension is anything above 140/90 mmHg. Like atherosclerosis, hypertension can cause unwanted conditions that quickly deteriorate a person’s health, such as coronary artery disease, heart failure, metabolic syndrome, stroke and aneurysm.

#2 Decreased Immune Response

Your body’s best defense against pathogens like viruses and bacteria is your immune system. It works constantly to fight off everyday nuisances like allergens and more severe illnesses, like the flu.

Chronic stress weakens your immune system by disrupting its natural balance. It increases the production of proinflammatory markers, leading to persistent inflammation in the body. This makes you more susceptible to infections and slows down your recovery time, leaving you more vulnerable to both minor and serious illnesses.

#3 Rapid Cellular Aging

For many, aging gracefully means more than just maintaining physical traits like smooth skin; it also involves reducing our biological age, which refers to how well our bodies function compared to our chronological age. For example, you might be 52, but with a healthy lifestyle, your biological age might be closer to 47.

One significant factor that negatively impacts our biological clock is chronic stress, which accelerates the shortening of telomeres: the protective caps at the ends of chromosomes. While telomeres naturally shorten over time, stress speeds up this process, leading to premature aging. This not only increases the likelihood of fine lines and wrinkles but also heightens the risk of age-related diseases such as diabetes, certain cancers and cardiovascular disease.

Stress and Life Expectancy: Quantifying the Impact

There’s no definitive answer concerning how many years stress could take from your life. Everyone’s genetics and lifestyles are vastly different, and those factors also play a role in determining a person’s overall health. However, according to a Finnish study on the impact of chronic stress on life expectancy, stress can reduce a person’s lifespan by about 2.8 years. This number is based on several factors, such as a person’s stress levels, how the body responds to stress and other health-related behaviors.

How to Cope with Life Stress

While constant stress may shorten one’s life expectancy by varying degrees, a study by Yale researchers suggests ways to slow the ticking of the biological clock. According to the study, individuals who effectively manage their emotions are better equipped to handle stressors.

So, instead of allowing stress to overwhelm your emotions and lead to anxiety and other negative feelings, you can enhance your emotional regulation through journaling, being mindful of your emotions and using cognitive-behavioral techniques to identify triggers that contribute to stress. This may help reduce the length of time you experience stress and its impacts on your well-being.

Advance Your Role in Healthcare with a Career in Aging

Understanding the relationship between stress and longevity can enhance not only your well-being but also the lives of those around you. If you’re passionate about helping older adults lead longer, more fulfilling (and less stressful) lives, consider pursuing a career in aging.

The University of Florida offers several flexible online graduate programs, including:

All of our online programs are tailored to working professionals, so you can complete your coursework on your timeline. (We’re all about minimizing stress and promoting a healthy work-life balance.)

Have any questions about which program might be ideal for your career goals? Reach out and we’ll help guide you in the right direction. Plus, with year-round start dates, we’re ready to review your application when you’re ready.

Sources:
https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/consumer-healthcare/what-is-cardiovascular-disease
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/high-blood-pressure/in-depth/high-blood-pressure/art-20045868
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5552071/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC534658/