Reconciling “stress” and “health” in physical anthropology: What can bioarchaeologists learn from the other subdisciplines?

TLDR

Stress and health are core concepts in physical anthropology, yet they differ: health is a holistic condition beyond physiological disruption, and bioarchaeological studies typically rely on skeletal markers of stress such as porotic hyperostosis and linear enamel hypoplasia. Bioarchaeologists should pursue interlinkages with other subfields within physical anthropology to bridge the concepts of stress and health. The symposium papers bring together bioarchaeologists, human biologists, molecular anthropologists, and primatologists to develop this link and encourage new avenues for considering health in past populations. Non‑specific stress indicators can signal infection, disease, or nutritional deficiencies, but they do not measure health in the same way as other anthropological subdisciplines.

Abstract

The concepts of "stress" and "health" are foundational in physical anthropology as guidelines for interpreting human behavior and biocultural adaptation in the past and present. Though related, stress and health are not coterminous, and while the term "health" encompasses some aspects of "stress," health refers to a more holistic condition beyond just physiological disruption, and is of considerable significance in contributing to anthropologists' understanding of humanity's lived experiences. Bioarchaeological interpretations of human health generally are made from datasets consisting of skeletal markers of stress, markers that result from (chronic) physiological disruption (e.g., porotic hyperostosis; linear enamel hypoplasia). Non-specific indicators of stress may measure episodes of stress and indicate that infection, disease, or nutritional deficiencies were present in a population, but in assessing these markers, bioarchaeologists are not measuring "health" in the same way as are human biologists, medical anthropologists, or primatologists. Rather than continue to diverge on separate (albeit parallel) trajectories, bioarchaeologists are advised to pursue interlinkages with other subfields within physical anthropology toward bridging "stress" and "health." The papers in this special symposium set include bioarchaeologists, human biologists, molecular anthropologists, and primatologists whose research develops this link between the concepts of "stress" and "health," encouraging new avenues for bioarchaeologists to consider and reconsider health in past human populations.