The effects of the cold pressor task on memory recall

Neurotransmitters that are released in response to stress can disrupt the prefrontal cortex creating an impairing effect on attentional processes leading to a hindering of memory recall (Arnsten, 2009). Participants were taken from an Intro to Psychology course from a small liberal arts college in Northeastern Pennsylvania. Participants immersed their hand in either ice-cold or warm water while listening to 20 nouns. In this present study, participants showed memory recall impairment after they received stress induced from the cold pressor task only during learning, and after a short delay consisting of a short distracter math test. Introduction to be remembered (Joels, Pu, Wiegert, Oitzl, & Krugers, 2006). Memory is the process of receiving, storing, retaining and retrieving information, and it can be influenced by multiple factors. One factor that can affect memory is aging. Memory decline in aging can result from factors that influence the executive function and the medial temporal lobe memory system (Buckner, 2004). Disruption of the medial temporal lobe memory system leads directly to memory impairment (Buckner, 2004). On the other hand, factors, such as stress, pose a threat to memory performance (Kail & Hall, 2001). There are factors related to stress that will determine how much memory is affected such as: the nature of the stressor, the emotional response to the stimulus, sex of the individual, and the interactions of these factors (Buchanan & Tranel, 2008). Stress can be divided into two categories: eustress, which is good stress, and distress, which is bad stress. Stress as defined by the American Psychological Association, is the psychological and physical response that an organism makes to a stimulus or changing condition, real or not, that alarms the organism and outweighs its ability to deal with the stimulus or changing condition ("Stress," n.d., para. 1). In one study, stress only assisted the learning and memory process when stress was experienced during the learning process and around the same time that the learning needs Certain structures of the brain that are important for memory function and are affected by stress include the hippocampus, amygdala, hypothalamus, and the prefrontal cortex (de Kloet, Oitzl, & Joels, 1999). Stress triggers two systems: the sympathetic nervous system (SNS), which results in the release of catecholamine's, and the hypothalamic-pituitaryadrenal axis (HPA), which results in the release of glucocorticoids (Elzinga, Bakker, & Bremner, 2005; Quesada, Weimers, Schoofs, & Wolf, 2011). The glucocorticoids use their effects through expedient delayed genomic pathways (Joels et al., 2006). The hormones and neurotransmitters that are released from the adrenal glands due to the response of stress, such as glucocorticoids and catecholamines provide a mechanism for the relationship between stress and memory (Elzinga et al., 2005; Tollenaar, Elzinga, Spinhoven, & Everaerd, 2008). Neurotransmitters that are released rapidly in response to stress can disrupt the prefrontal cortex structure and function, and hippocampal encoding process, leading to an impairing effect of stress on attentional processes and learning (Arnsten, 2009; Schwabe & Wolf, 2010). Delayed genomic glucocorticoid actions would suppress neural activity and reduce the processing of new information (Joels et al., 2006). It has been shown that a stress