Salivary Bioscience Research in Health Psychology and Behavioral Medicine

Since their inception, the fields of health psychology and behavioral medicine have largely adopted a biopsychosocial approach to understanding health and the manner in which psychological and social factors “get under the skin.” Facilitated by advances in salivary bioscience, great strides over the past several decades have been made in understanding the biological processes by which such factors influence health and disease. Health psychology and behavioral medicine research have integrated advanced clinical and laboratory assessments of relevant immune system and neuroendocrine markers in saliva to identify mechanisms, stress processes, and evaluate the impact of clinical intervention on physiological systems. This chapter highlights contributions of salivary bioscience to health psychology and behavioral medicine with an emphasis on research related to understanding adjustment to chronic illness and the influence of psychological and social factors on disease processes. Research utilizing salivary markers of hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis activity, sympathetic nervous system activation, as well as other neuroendocrine and immune processes has greatly contributed to our understanding of psychological adaptation to illness and the composition of clusters of adjustment-related symptoms such as fatigue, pain, and depression. In addition, documented changes in salivary levels of health-relevant biomarkers in response to behavioral interventions have contributed to a new definition of intervention efficacy. This broad synthesis of the literature emphasizes a more integrated biopsychosocial framework for understanding health and well-being.