A growing body of science shows the critical effects of an extreme and sustained stressful environment for children on their developing brain architecture and the expression of genes in later life. Toxic stress can shift the brain into surviving in a way that's more rigid and less adaptive. For example, as a result of biologically altered brain…

Reviews research on the effect of stress hormones, particularly glucocorticoids, on the brain and early development. It describes the psychological and social processes that reduce stress hormone responses to threatening and painful procedures. Research on the cognitive and emotional effects of synthetic glucocorticoids is also discussed.…

This essay argues that the activity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) system does not appear to be related to emotion regulation processes in children, although individual differences in emotion processes related to negative emotion temperaments appear to be associated with individual differences in HPA reactivity among normally…