[gvb]

"Dealt better with stress" is not the conclusion (inference) that concerns them in the paper:

"This is relevant, and problematic, because blunted stress responses in humans are associated with neuropsychiatric disorders like depression, schizophrenia, and autism." (emphasis mine).

[bruu_]

I interpreted it to mean that they have a blunted stress response, nothing more. Maybe a lot of people that undergo stress have a twofold reaction: 1. downregulate the response to similar stressors 2. still have some bad feelings about what happened

I would rather have 1 & 2 than just 2 alone. So yeah, when they say "associated with" they aren't saying "caused"