A soy-based phosphatidylserine/ phosphatidic acid complex (PAS) normalizes the stress reactivity of hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal-axis in chronically stressed male subjects: a randomized, placebo-controlled study

Table 4 Statistical information on group differences for AUC _G and AUC _I for salivary cortisol, serum cortisol and ACTH levels in response to acute stress

	low stressed subjects			high stressed subjects
salivary cortisol ^a
	χ²	df	p	χ²	df	p
AUC_G	1.32	2	0.518	0.82	2	0.664
AUC_I	0.43	2	0.805	6.48	2	0.039
Post hoc testing AUC _I in high stressed subjects ^b
	Z	p	r
PAS 400 group vs. Placebo group	−1.97	*0.049*	0.41
PAS 400 group vs. PAS 200 group	−2.37	*0.018*	0.51
PAS 200 group vs. Placebo group	−0.21	0.833
serum cortisol ^c
	F	df, error df	p	F	df, error df	p
AUC_G	0.44	2, 31	0.651	0.55	2, 30	0.585
AUC_I	0.09	2, 31	0.911	4.87	2, 28	0.015
Post hoc testing AUC _I in high stressed subjects ^d
			p
PAS 400 group vs. Placebo group			*0.035*
PAS 400 group vs. PAS 200 group			*0.033*
PAS 200 group vs. Placebo group			0.995
ACTH ^e
	F	df, error df	p	F	df, error df	p
group difference	1.60	2, 30	0.218	2.43	2, 29	0.106
increase differences	0.31	2, 30	0.737	4.54	2, 29	0.019
Post hoc testing ACTH increase in high stressed subjects ^e
	F	df, error df	p
PAS 400 group vs. Placebo group	8.22	1, 19	*0.010*
PAS 400 group vs. PAS 200 group	8.23	1, 20	*0.009*
PAS 200 group vs. Placebo group	0.25	1, 19	0.627

PAS 200 group: 200 mg PA & 200 mg PS per day; PAS 400 group: 400 mg PA & 400 mg PS per day.
Significant p-values are written in bold letters. Post hoc analyses are written in italic letters, ACTH = adrenocorticotropic hormone.
^a statistics based on Kruskal Wallis H Test.
^b statistics based on Mann–Whitney U test.
^c statistics based on univariate analysis of variance.
^d statistics based on Tukey post hoc testing.
^e statistics based on repeated measures analysis of variance.