Dr. Cameron’s laboratory studies the effect of exposure to mild, everyday stresses on long-term health. Studies focus on identifying the neural systems which respond to stress and understanding how changes in the functional activity of these systems modulate stress-responsive physiological systems, including behavior, neuroendocrine function, body weight, cognitive function, attention, and motivation. The stresses studied include metabolic stresses (such as dieting, missing meals, and exercise), and psychosocial stress (such as being separated from familiar individuals and introduced to unfamiliar individuals). Studies utilize nonhuman primates, and many studies combine clinical work with experimental work to understand both the mechanisms underlying responses to chronic stress exposure, as well as the clinical implications of such stress exposure.

Experimental approaches include in vivo physiological studies monitoring behavior, hormone secretion, heart rate, metabolic substrates, neurotransmitter release and pharmacological studies. Collaborative work with several other laboratories allows histochemical examination of neural systems modulated by stresses using microarray analysis followed by in situ hybridization to identify changes in neuronal gene expression.