Fatigue is a pervasive and debilitating symptom that is experienced by millions of individuals. It is one of the top reasons for health care utilization, thus leading to tremendous societal costs. Fatigue has a variety of etiologies; it may be an accompanying symptom of numerous illnesses, such as multiple sclerosis, cancer, or diabetes, but it is also a cardinal symptom of other conditions, such as burnout, major depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, and – with accumulating evidence – Long Covid.
Stress has been suggested as a potential pathophysiological factor for fatigue, independent of the etiology of an accompanying health condition. Alterations of the HPA axis and the immune system may represent a common pathway linking a precipitating factor like stress with fatigue. Numerous strategies have been attempted to prevent and treat fatigue in various populations with varying results. Given the above-described biological alterations of the stress system (which are particularly evident in severe and/or chronic fatigue), studying interactions of treatment intervention and biological outcome variables could be very promising.
This Article Collection will specifically focus on manuscripts (original papers, reviews, and commentaries dealing with conceptual and/or methodological considerations, protocol papers of planned studies, and treatment studies) that include fatigue in its various facets (fatigue as an isolated symptom, in concert with other symptoms, as a cardinal feature of one or several illnesses, and as a key symptom as part of various concepts related to chronic fatigue, e.g. chronic fatigue (syndrome), myalgic encephalitis, burnout, vital exhaustion).
Note that papers that do not include biological variables/cover biological processes cannot be considered for publication in Stress.
Urs Nater is a Full Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Vienna. His research focuses on identifying the underlying mechanisms that translate stress into illness. He is the Director of the Biochemical Lab and of the Music & Health Lab at the Faculty of Psychology and currently serves as Head of the Institute of Clinical and Health Psychology, as well as Speaker of University Research Platform “The Stress of Life.” He is Past-President of the International Society of Behavioral Medicine (2021-2023), Vice-President of the World Association for Stress and Anxiety-related Disorders, and serves as Associate Editor-in-Chief of Stress – the International Journal on the Biology of Stress. His work has received numerous distinctions as well as funding from national and international agencies.
Nida Ali studied Psychology at the University of Toronto and McGill University. She studied the mechanistic interactions among the biological and psychological stress systems during acute stress during her PhD at McGill University. Since 2019, she has expanded her research at the University of Vienna investigating the interrelationships between the stress and immune regulation in chronic stress and associated clinical conditions.
Disclosure Statement: The Guest Advisors have no conflicts of interest to disclose regarding this work.
