Looking at the research of Robert Sapolsky, Mike Springer lays out how "the human species has managed … to turn one of its most basic survival mechanisms … against itself":
"If you’re a normal mammal," Sapolsky says, "what stress is about is three minutes of screaming terror on the savannah, after which either it’s over with or you’re over with." During those three minutes of terror the body responds to imminent danger by deploying stress hormones that stimulate the heart rate and blood pressure while inhibiting other functions, like digestion, growth and reproduction. The problem is, human beings tend to secrete these hormones constantly in response to the pressures of everyday life.
Springer points out that stress affects certain groups more:
By studying baboon populations in East Africa, Sapolsky has found that individuals lower down in the social hierarchy suffer more stress, and consequently more stress-related health problems, than dominant individuals. The same trend in human populations was discovered in the British Whitehall Study. People with more control in work environments have lower stress, and better health, than subordinates.
The Dish 