Allostasis, Homeostasis, and the Costs of Physiological Adaptation

The concept of homeostasis, the maintenance of the internal physiological environment of an organism within tolerable limits, is well established in medicine and physiology. In contrast, allostasis is a relatively new idea. Allostasis explains how regulatory events maintain organismic viability, or not, in diverse contexts with varying setpoints of bodily needs and competing motivations. Allostasis accounts for wide variation in function, adaptation, and cephalic involvement in systemic physiological regulation. It provides a conceptual framework for both the protective and the damaging effects that occur in overall regulation of physiological and behavioral systems. This book, the first edited volume to focus on allostasis, orients the reader by addressing basic physiological regulatory systems and examining bodily regulation under duress. It integrates the basic concepts of physiological homeostasis with disorders such as depression, stress, anxiety, and addiction and will therefore appeal to graduate students, medical students, and researchers working in related areas.