Anxiety and helplessness in the face of stress predisposes, precipitates, and sustains gastric ulceration

When an organism is subjected to stress, gastric ulcers or ulcerations comm only develop but the vulnerability to and amount of pathology induced varie s considerably between individuals. The role of psychological factors in de termining the occurrence and severity of these ulcerations is amply demonst rated in the studies reviewed here. The present paper (a) gives a brief his tory of the search for the causes of gastric ulcer, (b) provides a review o f our own research which reveals that vulnerability to gastric ulceration i s modulated by psychologically meaningful experiences, and (c) offers a mul tifactorial perspective on the causes of gastric ulceration and the future of research on it. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.