Stress researchers have become increasing aware of the ways in which structural and psychosocial variations in the life course shape exposure and vulnerability to social stress. This volume of Advances in Life Course Research explores, theoretically and empirically, stress processes both within and across specific life stages.
Chapters within this volume incorporate several areas of research, including:
-How physical and mental health trajectories are shaped by life course variations in stressors and resources
-Stress associated with social role transitions and the significance of different role trajectories for stress exposure and outcomes
-Life course variations in the quality and content of institutional contexts (such as school, work and family) and their significance for stress processes
-Differences in types, levels, and effects of different stress-moderating resources within and across life course stages
-Ways in which race, gender, and social class influence or condition stress processes over the life course
-The relevance of "linked lives" within families and across generations for stress exposure and vulnerability
-Historical variations in stress-related conditions and cohort differences in stress experiences
-Methodological and theoretical advances in studying stress processes across the life course

In 1981, Leonard Pearlin and his colleagues published an article that would ra- cally shift the sociological study of mental health from an emphasis on psychiatric disorder to a focus on social structure and its consequences for stress and psyc- logical distress. Pearlin et al. (1981) proposed a deceptively simple conceptual model that has now influenced sociological inquiry for almost three decades. With his characteristic penchant for reconsidering and elaborating his own ideas, Pearlin has revisited the stress process model periodically over the years (Pearlin 1989, 1999; Pearlin et al. 2005; Pearlin and Skaff 1996). One of the consequences of this continued theoretical elaboration of the stress process has been the development of a sociological model of stress that embraces the complexity of social life. Another consequence is that the stress process has continued to stimulate a host of empirical investigations in the sociology of mental health. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to suggest that the stress process paradigm has been primarily responsible for the growth and sustenance of sociological research on stress and mental health. Pearlin et al. (1981) described the core elements of the stress process in a brief paragraph: The process of social stress can be seen as combining three major conceptual domains: the sources of stress, the mediators of stress, and the manifestations of stress. Each of these extended domains subsumes a variety of subparts that have been intensively studied in recent years.