
Donna Jackson Nakazawa Explains Psycho Neuroimmunology: How Emotions and Trauma Affect Your Immunity and Disease Risk
Donna Jackson Nakazawa is the author of seven books about what she likes to call “gnarly problems” that span the intersection of science, emotion, and human life, most recently the book Girls on the Brink. One of the gnarly topics she’s done a deep dive on is something called psycho neuroimunology, which is the field that looks at the interplay between our mind and our immune system. As she learned in her research, the relationship between the two is strong — and it all starts in childhood. Read on to learn more about the emerging field of psycho neuroimmunology, what it has to do with adverse childhood experiences (ACE) research, how emotions affect the body physically by way of the brain, and more.