A growing body of research suggests that inequality can be stressful for all within a society. We consider this assertion by exploring whether there is evidence of physiological stress responses to different income and inequality conditions in a hypothetical society. The combined effect of inequality for different income groups on cardiovascular reactivity was assessed while participants engaged in purchasing decisions. The study included 102 participants, 84 of which had full data for analyses (42 male, 41 female, 1 unspecified). The average age was 23 years. A 3 × 2 design manipulated both inequality (stable, increasing, and decreasing) and income (high and low). Cardiovascular reactivity was operationalized as change in heart rate (HR) and blood pressure (BP; diastolic and systolic) responses at the end of the purchasing task compared with baseline. Although there was no direct association between income, inequality, and BP, results indicated that low-income participants had the higher HR reactivity to stable inequality compared with increasing inequality. These findings indicate that inequality has the hallmarks of a stressor; this is contingent on the type of inequality. This suggests that inequality itself may be detrimental to future health via the stress pathway. These findings highlight that the nature of inequality, increasing, decreasing, or stable is relevant to its impact and that these impacts of inequality may extend to the biological.

中文翻译：

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对虚拟社会中不同收入群体不平等的生理压力反应

越来越多的研究表明，不平等会给社会中的所有人带来压力。我们通过探索是否有证据表明在一个假设的社会中对不同收入和不平等状况的生理压力反应来考虑这一断言。在参与者进行购买决策时，评估了不同收入群体不平等对心血管反应性的综合影响。该研究包括 102 名参与者，其中 84 名具有完整的分析数据（42 名男性，41 名女性，1 名未指定）。平均年龄为 23 岁。一个 3 × 2 的设计控制了不平等（稳定、增加和减少）和收入（高和低）。心血管反应性被操作为心率 (HR) 和血压 (BP; 与基线相比，购买任务结束时的舒张压和收缩压）反应。尽管收入、不平等和血压之间没有直接关联，但结果表明，与不平等加剧相比，低收入参与者对稳定不平等的 HR 反应更高。这些发现表明不平等具有压力源的特征；这取决于不平等的类型。这表明不平等本身可能通过压力途径对未来的健康有害。这些发现强调了不平等的性质，增加、减少或稳定与其影响相关，并且不平等的这些影响可能扩展到生物学。结果表明，与不平等加剧相比，低收入参与者对稳定不平等的 HR 反应更高。这些发现表明不平等具有压力源的特征；这取决于不平等的类型。这表明不平等本身可能通过压力途径对未来的健康有害。这些发现强调了不平等的性质，增加、减少或稳定与其影响相关，并且不平等的这些影响可能扩展到生物学。结果表明，与不平等加剧相比，低收入参与者对稳定不平等的 HR 反应更高。这些发现表明不平等具有压力源的特征；这取决于不平等的类型。这表明不平等本身可能通过压力途径对未来的健康有害。这些发现强调了不平等的性质，增加、减少或稳定与其影响相关，并且不平等的这些影响可能扩展到生物学。