Why a new book on stress when so many are already available? There is widespread awareness of the impact of scientific research in this field, both theoretical and practical. Scores of articles and books have been published. What is especially exciting about the range of theories and ideas presented in this book is that they derive from a variety of different intellectual traditions and scientific disciplines. The book is not an attempt to replace more extensive or basic treatments of this subject. Rather, it seeks to present the authors viewpoints together with data and methodological applications based on their personal experience in a straightforward manner. A number of the articles were commissioned some time ago, when Horst Mayer decided to publish the papers presented at a symposium which he organized in Heidelberg under the auspices of the German College of Psychosomatic Medicine. Others emerged from later contacts with authors in different parts of the world. The result is a rather heterogeneous collection of "perspectives" on stress which, it is hoped, will stimulate readers to arrive at their own conclusions through its very diversity. When it was decided that Femando Lolas would join this endeavor at the end of 1984, it became clear that the material had lost none of its appeal.