PSYCHOSOCIAL FACTORS & NEUROENDOCRINE FUNCTION IN AGING

本NIA-SERCA应用于行为老年病学的目的是

The purpose of this NIA-SERCA application in behavioral geriatrics is to provide the applicant with training in neuroendocrinology to complement her existing expertise in psychosocial epidemiology and aging. Such training will permit the applicant to pursue her interest in the role of psychosocial factors in trajectories of aging, specifically the hypothesis that one of the ways in which such factors may influence patterns of health and functioning with age is through their modulation of patterns of neuroendocrine response to stimuli. This SERCA application is designed to provide the applicant with the necessary knowledge and research skills to pursue her immediate career goal of developing a series of research protocols to examine the influence of characteristics such as self-esteem, personal mastery and social support on differential patterns of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis response to "challenge". The proposed SERCA program of training incorporates both coursework and laboratory research training in neuroendocrinology and neuroanatomy to provide the applicant with the requisite knowledge and skills to develop and implement such studies. Dr. Richard Robbins, a neuroendocrinologist, will serve as the applicant's sponsor and primary mentor; Dr. Caleb Finch, a neurobiologist with particular expertise in aging, will be her mentor for neuroanatomy; Dr. Burton Singer, a biostatistician, will provide training in statistical analysis of "reactivity" data while Dr. Karen Matthew, a psychologist, will serve as a mentor/consultant on study design and instrumentation issues relating psychosocial factors to patterns of physiologic "reactivity". In terms of longterm career goals, the proposed SERCA training would provide the applicant with a unique combination of skills in both neuroendocrinology and psychosocial epidemiology which would enable her to pursue her interest in developing a multidisciplinary program of research on aging which incorporates neuroendocrine parameters along with psychosocial factors, "disease" status and functional abilities in models of aging. The applicant's department is strongly supportive of this goal as it fits within the larger school-wide goal of developing more multidisciplinary research greater interdisciplinary research which incorporates both psychosocial and physiologic parameters. The applicant's unique combination of skills, bridging the disciplines of neuroendocrinology and psychosocial epidemiology, would enable her to take the lead role in developing such a program of research. Thus, the proposed SERCA training would be central to the applicant's ability to develop as an independent scientist within her chosen area of research on aging.