The Ear Under Stress: Bidirectional Links Between Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal (HPA) Activation and Auditory Function

The detection, processing, and conscious experience of sound is continuously shaped by physiological and emotional state, and few states exert a more powerful influence than stress. Acute and chronic stress alter the auditory system at every level, from molecular signaling in the cochlea and central auditory pathways to the subjective experience of sound. Stress hormones such as cortisol and corticosterone, receptor-level changes including glutamatergic signaling, and inflammatory and infectious processes can all reshape how auditory information is encoded and perceived.The relationship between stress and auditory function is bidirectional. Intrusive, distressing, or uncontrollable sounds can become potent stressors, fueling a self-reinforcing cycle that is increasingly recognized as central to some of the most challenging and poorly understood perceptual conditions, including tinnitus, hyperacusis, misophonia, phonophobia, and sudden sensorineural hearing loss. These conditions are understood not as purely cochlear or otological problems, but as disorders of auditory perception and sensory cognition, involving selective auditory attention, emotional salience, amygdala-linked processing, and altered multisensory integration. Understanding them requires bridging molecular and cellular neuroscience, psychophysics, cognitive and affective neuroscience, and clinical perception research.This Research Topic aims to consolidate interdisciplinary work that clarifies how stress can shape auditory perception and sensory cognition, and how altered auditory perception contributes to stress and its downstream consequences. Contributions that connect mechanism to perception, linking physiological, molecular, or inflammatory changes to measurable perceptual, attentional, or cognitive outcomes, are particularly encouraged. The goal is to advance a more integrated, perception-grounded model of sound sensitivity and stress-related auditory change. In keeping with the scope of the Perception Science section, the focus is on perception and its underlying mechanisms. Submissions addressing clinical conditions are considered where they are grounded in the study of auditory perception, sensory cognition, attention, or perceptual rehabilitation.Themes and areas of interest include, but are not limited to:• The stress-auditory axis: effects of cortisol and corticosterone on auditory processing and perception; receptor-level changes including glutamatergic signaling; infection and inflammation as modulators of auditory perception• Emotional and attentional links: selective auditory attention under stress; the acoustic tunnel effect and attentional narrowing; emotional salience and amygdala-linked processing in tinnitus and sound aversion.• Disorders of sound sensitivity, auditory perception and clinical intervention approaches: tinnitus, hyperacusis, misophonia, and phonophobia examined through perceptual, psychophysical, attentional, or sensory-cognitive frameworks with explorations in treatment, intervention, and clinical rehabilitation approaches in applied psychological and neuroscience contexts.• Sudden sensorineural hearing loss: perceptual and sensory-cognitive consequences, recovery, and the role of stress as a modulator.• Perceptual rehabilitation and psychotherapeutic approaches: sound-based and soundscape interventions, natural soundscapes, and novel approaches grounded in perceptual mechanisms and applied clinical and health psychology.• Broader connections: auditory neuroscience of stress; multisensory integration under stress; stress-sleep-hearing interactions and downstream perceptual consequences including effects of sleep disruption on auditory perception.• Methods and models: human, animal, and computational models of stress-modulated auditory perception; biomarkers linked to perceptual outcomes; individual differences in stress-related auditory sensitivity. Topic editors: Agnieszka J. Szczepek, Magdalena Sereda, Marc Fagelson Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/83661/the-ear-under-stress-bidirectional-links-between-hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal-hpa-activation-and-auditory-function