Abstract
We are excited to announce the launch of a new journal, Chronic Stress. The detrimental effects of chronic stress are increasingly evident in preclinical and clinical research. The journal will publish original and review articles related to stress across psychiatric disorders.
The journal will be peer-reviewed and open-access. It will publish original and review articles related to all aspects of stress, including preclinical and clinical studies of stress-related psychiatric disorders (e.g., mood, anxiety, and trauma-related disorders). The journal will focus on the neurobiology, prevention, assessment, and treatment of the behavioral and biological effects of stress. Progress in the field of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience has been hampered by the lack of replicable biosignatures of diagnosis, biomarkers of treatment response, and biological surrogate treatment endpoints. This is especially affected by the fact that psychiatric diagnoses are heterogeneous syndromes and, to some extent, are difficult to fully model preclinically. Conversely, prolonged stress has long been studied preclinically and is a major component of most psychiatric disorders, with a constellation of clinical biological abnormalities that might be disease nonspecific or related to the negative effects of prolonged stress (e.g., gray matter abnormalities). The journal will highlight translational and clinical reports focusing on biomarkers and treatment of prolonged stress, regardless of the psychiatric diagnosis.
The journal will also aim to emphasize the recently proposed Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) approaches in three primary ways: first, by cultivating a discussion on how we best define or study the chronic stress construct within the RDoC framework; second, by spreading and educating the RDoC concept to individuals and institutions with high stakes in mental health research; and third, by promoting a discussion on RDoC-related questions (e.g., Is the field ready for a biologically based definition of the constellation of stress-induced brain abnormalities, collectively named Distress Pathology?).
In the process, subtle and often ambiguous issues could be addressed. For example, how does the field advance construct-based research without undermining the disorder-based knowledge and, more importantly, treatments. Finally, a critical step in the progress of emerging concepts is to nurture a debate between competing views. In that regard, Chronic Stress will seek and foster input of data and opinions underscoring the gaps in current RDoC conceptualization. We believe a constructive critique will be essential in the optimization of RDoC approaches and in the drive toward progress beyond RDoC.