THE ASSESSMENT OF THE EMOTIONAL AND IMMUNOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF EXAMINATION STRESS

Sixteen final-year students and 14 nonstudents were recruited into a p ilot study exploring the utility of the Merieux Multitest CMI in ident ifying stress-related immune impairment The results of the investigati on revealed that the examination group reported greater stress than th e nonexamination group. The relationship between stress and immune imp airment was explored using two widely held definitions of stress (i.e. , stimulus and response). When stress was defined as the stimulus (i.e , examination versus nonexamination groups), reactions to the skin tes t were not significantly different. However when stress was defined as the response (i.e., high stress versus low stress scores), the high-s tress individuals were found to have poorer reactions to the skin test than the low-stress subjects. The results of the study highlight the need for greater precision in the definition of the term stress and, a lso, suggest that Multitest CMI can provide a rapid and reproducible m eans of assessing stress-related immune dysfunction.