Stress responses vary drastically for a given set of stimuli, individuals, or points in time. A potential source of this variance that is not well characterized arises from the theory of stress as a dynamical system, which implies a complex, nonlinear relationship between environmental/situational inputs and the development/experience of stress. In this framework, stress vs. non-stress states exist as attractor basins in a physiologic phase space. Here, we develop a model of stress as a dynamical system by coupling closed loop physiologic control to a dynamic oscillator in an attractor landscape. By characterizing the evolution of this model through phase space, we demonstrate strong sensitivity to the parameters controlling the dynamics and demonstrate multiple features of stress responses found in current research, implying that these parameters may contribute to a significant source of variability observed in empiric stress research.

对于一组给定的刺激、个人或时间点，压力反应会有很大的不同。压力作为动力系统的理论产生的这种变化的潜在来源没有得到很好的表征，这意味着环境/情境输入与压力的发展/经历之间存在复杂的非线性关系。在这个框架中，压力与非压力状态作为生理相空间中的吸引池存在。在这里，我们通过将闭环生理控制耦合到吸引子景观中的动态振荡器来开发压力模型作为动态系统。通过表征该模型在相空间中的演变，我们展示了对控制动力学的参数的强烈敏感性，并展示了当前研究中发现的应力响应的多种特征，