Does anger kill brain cells

Answer 1

Actually, anger induces emotional stress, which takes a toll on brain cells by increasing adrenergic activity via the HPA (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal) axis. This causes increases in cortisol, a stress hormone. Emotional stress also induces cumulative cellular damage due to increases in what is called oxidative stress (the increased metabolic breakdown of cellular materials leading to free radical production).

While young persons have bodies that have much less cumulative damage (due to youth), and have active DNA and cellular repair mechanisms, as people get older, these repair mechanisms accumulate damage themselves (through environmental factors and even the cells' own metabolic processes), and they work less effectively.

Since emotional/oxidate stress has been shown to increase the "load" on cells, increasing the rate of this damage, the older a person gets, and the more stress the body is under, the more likely their cells will be unable to repair this damage, and the more likely that brain cell death will increase.

Now, there are many other, more pronounced mechanisms that result in brain cell death or deactivation in the presence of emotional stress. The homeostatic, regulatory factors of the brain can sense prolonged adrenergic stress and will downregulate (desensitize) certain neural pathways in order to minimize the stress signal. It also "rewires" certain neural pathways to adapt to stressful environments. Large-scale changes based on high-stress are often found in neurotic (anxiety) disorders and in PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder).