How do early and recent life stress shape cortisol reactivity and decision making in middle-toolder adulthood?

Greater lifetime stressor exposure and acute stress are both related to greater risky decision making; however, lifetime stressor exposure is also associated with blunted physiological response to acute stress, implying nuanced relations among life stress, acute stress, and decision making. In support of this, some work suggests that specific timings of stressor exposure (e.g., childhood vs. adulthood) may differentially relate to both physiology and decision making. To date, however, no work has concurrently examined lifetime and acute stressor exposure in relation to risky decision making. To address this issue, we examined how lifetime stressor exposure as assessed with the Stress and Adversity Inventory for Adults (STRAIN) is related to cortisol reactivity to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) and risky decision making in 63 middle-to-older aged adults (age range: 45-81 years). In the decision making task, participants made decisions about gambles framed as either gains or losses before and after the TSST. Regardless of age, participants with greater early and recent life stressor exposure exhibited lower cortisol reactivity than those with less of those exposures. Also regardless of age, participants made riskier decisions on loss trials than on gain trials. Finally, older adults reporting more early life and recent life stressor exposures showed the riskiest decision making after the TSST than younger adults who reported lower life stressor exposure. Early and recent life stressor exposure are associated with stress-related changes in physiology and decision making. These changes may lead to risky decision making in older age.