Effect of recurrent task-induced acute stress on task performance, vagally mediated heart rate variability, and task-evoked pupil response.

Advances in wearable sensor technologies can be leveraged to investigate behavioral and physiological responses in task-induced stress environments. Reliable and valid multidimensional assessments are required to detect stress given its multidimensional nature. This study investigated the effect of recurrent task-induced acute stress on task performance, vagally mediated heart variability measures (vmHRV) and task-evoked pupillary response (TEPR). Task performance, vmHRV measures, and TEPR were collected from 32 study participants while they performed a computer-based task in a recurrent task-induced acute stress environment. Mixed-effects modeling was used to assess the sensitivity of each outcome variable to experimental conditions. Repeated measures correlation tests were used to examine associations between outcome variables. Task performance degraded under stress. vmHRV measures were lower in the stress conditions relative to the no stress conditions. TEPR was found to be higher in the stress conditions compared to the no stress conditions. Task performance was negatively associated with the vmHRV measures, and degraded task performance was linked to increased TEPR in the stress conditions. There were positive associations between vmHRV measures. TEPR was negatively associated with vmHRV measures. Although task-induced stress degrades task performance, recurrent exposure to that stress could alter this effect via habituation. Further, our findings suggest that vmHRV measures and TEPR are sensitive enough to quantify psychophysiological responses to recurrent task-induced stress.

Physiological evidence of stress reduction during a summer Antarctic expedition with a significant influence of previous experience and vigor.

Antarctica provides a unique environment for studying human adaptability, characterized by controlled conditions, limited sensory stimulation, and significant challenges in logistics and communication. This longitudinal study investigates the relationship between stress indicators, with a specific focus on mean sleep heart rate, during a COVID-19 quarantine and subsequent 83 days long summer Antarctic expedition at the J. G. Mendel Czech Antarctic Station. Our novel approach includes daily recordings of sleep heart rate and weekly assessments of emotions, stress, and sleep quality. Associations between variables were analyzed using the generalized least squares method, providing unique insights into nuances of adaptation. The results support previous findings by providing empirical evidence on the stress reducing effect of Antarctic summer expedition and highlight the importance of previous experience and positive emotions, with the novel contribution of utilizing physiological data in addition to psychological measures. High-frequency sampling and combination of psychological and physiological data addresses a crucial gap in the research of stress. This study contributes valuable knowledge to the field of psychophysiology and has implications for expedition planners, research organizations, teams in action settings, pandemic prevention protocols, global crises, and long-duration spaceflight missions. Comprehensive insights promote the well-being and success of individuals in extreme conditions.

A comprehensive scan of psychological disciplines through self-identification on Google Scholar: Relative endorsement, topical coverage, and publication patterns.

Psychological researchers often identify with psychological disciplines, such as social or clinical psychology. The current study analyzed Google Scholar profiles from 6,532 international scientists who attracted more than 100 citations in 2019 and self-identified with at least one of 10 common psychological disciplines (psychoanalysis; clinical psychology; (cognitive) neuroscience; developmental psychology; educational psychology; experimental psychology; biological psychology/psychophysiology; mathematical psychology/psychometrics; social psychology; personality psychology). Results indicated that almost half of all psychologists self-identified with either social psychology or cognitive neuroscience. There were 487 topics that were endorsed at least five times, ranging from highly discipline-specific topics to more integrative ones, such as emotion and personality. We also factor-analyzed frequencies of topical endorsement across disciplines and found two factors, which we interpreted as reflecting correlational and experimental research traditions (with social psychology being the largest discipline within the former tradition and cognitive neuroscience being the largest discipline within the latter tradition). Differences in productivity and impact were also found, with researchers identifying with psychometrics being the most productive and researchers identifying with personality psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and multidisciplinary psychology as the most impactful in terms of citation increases per additional output. Recommendations for promoting cross-fertilization across psychological disciplines are formulated.

The psychometric upgrade psychophysiology needs.

Although biological measurements are constrained by the same fundamental psychometric principles as self-report measurements, these essential principles are often neglected in most fields of neuroscience, including psychophysiology. Potential reasons for this neglect could include a lack of understanding of appropriate measurement theory or a lack of accessible software for psychometric analysis. Generalizability theory is a flexible and multifaceted measurement theory that is well suited to handling the nuances of psychophysiological data, such as the often unbalanced number of trials and intraindividual variability of scores of event-related brain potential (ERP) data. The ERP Reliability Analysis Toolbox (ERA Toolbox) was designed for psychophysiologists and is tractable software that can support the routine evaluation of psychometrics using generalizability theory. Psychometrics can guide task refinement, data-processing decisions, and selection of candidate biomarkers for clinical trials. The present review provides an extensive treatment of additional psychometric characteristics relevant to studies of psychophysiology, including validity and validation, standardization, dimensionality, and measurement invariance. Although the review focuses on ERPs, the discussion applies broadly to psychophysiological measures and beyond. The tools needed to rigorously assess psychometric reliability and validate psychophysiological measures are now readily available. With the profound implications that psychophysiological research can have on understanding brain-behavior relationships and the identification of biomarkers, there is simply too much at stake to ignore the crucial processes of evaluating psychometric reliability and validity.

Impaired motor inhibition during perceptual inhibition in older, but not younger adults: a psychophysiological study.

The prefrontal cortex (PFC) governs the ability to rapidly cancel planned movements when no longer appropriate (motor inhibition) and ignore distracting stimuli (perceptual inhibition). It is unclear to what extent these processes interact, and how they are impacted by age. The interplay between perceptual and motor inhibition was investigated using a Flanker Task, a Stop Signal Task and a combined Stop Signal Flanker Task in healthy young (n = 33, Mean = 24 years) and older adults (n = 32, Mean = 71 years). PFC activity was measured with functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), while electromyography (EMG) measured muscle activity in the fingers used to respond to the visual cues. Perceptual inhibition (the degree to which incongruent flankers slowed response time to a central cue) and motor inhibition (the speed of cancellation of EMG activation following stop cues) independently declined with age. When both processes were engaged together, PFC activity increased for both age groups, however only older adults exhibited slower motor inhibition. The results indicate that cortical upregulation was sufficient to compensate for the increased task demands in younger but not older adults, suggesting potential resource sharing and neural limitations particularly in older adults.

Conditioning to true content and artificial intelligence in psychophysiological intention recognition.

OBJECTIVE: The objective is to introduce a novel method for classical conditioning to true content (CtTC), and for the first time, apply this approach in the concealed information test (CIT) to effectively discern intentions. During CtTC, participants are trained to exhibit electrodermal responses whenever they recognize true content on a screen. Additionally, the objective is to evaluate a novel CIT-dataset preprocessing algorithm, employed to enhance machine learning (ML) classification performance. METHODS: A total of 84 participants were evenly divided into four groups. Two groups of participants devised plans for stealing money from a supermarket, while the other two groups did not engage in any planning. One planning group and one non-planning group underwent CIT examination, while the remaining groups were subjected to CtTC. RESULTS: The CIT accuracy initially stood at 52 % and increased to 71 % after Z-score and ML classification (McNemar test, p < 0.05). Conversely, the CtTC accuracy was 76 % and significantly improved to 93 % following Z-score and 95 % following ML classification (McNemar test, p < 0.05). In the best-performing classifiers, CtTC exhibited significantly superior metrics for guilty/innocent classification compared to CIT (Fisher's exact test, p < 0.05, power 1 - ß > 0.90). In the CtTC group, reactivity and sensitivity significantly increased, indicated by higher EDR amplitudes (p < 0.05, two-tailed t-test, power 1 - ß = 0.89) and the number of EDRs (p < 0.05, Fisher's exact test, power 1 - ß = 0.90). There was no statistically significant difference between the Z-score and ML classification. CONCLUSIONS: In the assessment of intentions, CtTC enhances both the sensitivity and accuracy of the CIT.

Beyond single paradigms, pipelines, and outcomes: Embracing multiverse analyses in psychophysiology.

Psychophysiological research is an inherently complex undertaking due to the nature of the data, and its analysis is characterized by many decision points that shape the final dataset and a study's findings. These decisions create a "multiverse" of possible outcomes, and each decision from study conceptualization to statistical analysis can lead to different results and interpretations. This review describes the concept of multiverse analyses, a methodological approach designed to understand the impact of different decisions on the robustness of a study's findings and interpretation. The emphasis is on transparently showcasing different reasonable approaches for constructing a final dataset and on highlighting the influence of various decision points, from experimental design to data processing and outcome selection. For example, the choice of an experimental task can significantly impact event-related brain potential (ERP) scores or skin conductance responses (SCRs), and different tasks might elicit unique variances in each measure. This review underscores the importance of transparently embracing the flexibility inherent in psychophysiological research and the potential consequences of not understanding the fragility or robustness of experimental findings. By navigating the intricate terrain of the psychophysiological multiverse, this review serves as an introduction, helping researchers to make informed decisions, improve the collective understanding of psychophysiological findings, and push the boundaries of the field.

The psychophysiology of Mastermind: Characterizing response times and blinking in a high-stakes television game show.

Television game shows have proven to be a valuable resource for studying human behavior under conditions of high stress and high stakes. However, previous work has focused mostly on choices-ignoring much of the rich visual information that is available on screen. Here, we take a first step to extracting more of this information by investigating the response times and blinking of contestants in the BBC show Mastermind. In Mastermind, contestants answer rapid-fire quiz questions while a camera slowly zooms in on their faces. By labeling contestants' behavior and blinks from 25 episodes, we asked how accuracy, response times, and blinking varied over the course of the game. For accuracy and response times, we tested whether contestants responded more accurately and more slowly after an error-exhibiting the "post-error increase in accuracy" and "post-error slowing" which has been repeatedly observed in the lab. For blinking, we tested whether blink rates varied according to the cognitive demands of the game-decreasing during periods of cognitive load, such as when pondering a response, and increasing at event boundaries in the task, such as the start of a question. In contrast to the lab, evidence for post-error changes in accuracy and response time was weak, with only marginal effects observed. In line with the lab, blinking varied over the course of the game much as we predicted. Overall, our findings demonstrate the potential of extracting dynamic signals from game shows to study the psychophysiology of behavior in the real world.

"My Opponent Prof. W.": The debate between Wilhelm Wundt and Adolf Horwicz in the beginning of physiological psychology (1872-1879).

Adolf Horwicz (1831-1894) was the main public critic of Wilhelm Wundt's election for the chair of philosophy at the Universität Leipzig in 1875. Horwicz's book titled Psychologische Analysen auf physiologischer Grundlage published in 1872 had a great impact on his contemporaries. Two years later, Wundt published Grundzüge der physiologischen Psychologie (1874) and with Horwicz's books were recognized as the most representative books of the emerging physiological psychology. Finally, Horwicz and Wundt had a debate published in Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie during 1879-1880 in where Wundt affirmed that many of Horwicz's research results were deduced from preconceived ideas without using a clear method. For that reason, Horwicz considered that Wundt's criticisms were aimed at destroying his scientific reputation. The debate is the materialization of a long professional struggle that took place between professional philosophers and physiologists who began to occupy chairs of philosophy in the early 1870s. The debate can be summarized in the following questions: (a) Should psychology have as its main objective the search for a single physical-biological process to which all other psychical processes are reduced? (b) Should psychological research use an inductivist reasoning? (c) What should be the relationship between philosophy and the psychological psychology? (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Emotional arousal pattern (EMAP): A new database for modeling momentary subjective and psychophysiological responding to affective stimuli.

This article describes a new database (named "EMAP") of 145 individuals' reactions to emotion-provoking film clips. It includes electroencephalographic and peripheral physiological data as well as moment-by-moment ratings for emotional arousal in addition to overall and categorical ratings. The resulting variation in continuous ratings reflects inter-individual variability in emotional responding. To make use of the moment-by-moment data for ratings as well as neurophysiological activity, we used a machine learning approach. The results show that algorithms that are based on temporal information improve predictions compared to algorithms without a temporal component, both within and across participant modeling. Although predicting moment-by-moment changes in emotional experiences by analyzing neurophysiological activity was more difficult than using aggregated experience ratings, selecting a subset of predictors improved the prediction. This also showed that not only single features, for example, skin conductance, but a range of neurophysiological parameters explain variation in subjective fluctuations of subjective experience.

Treatment Effects on Psychophysiological Stress Responses in Youth With Obesity.

OBJECTIVE: Stress plays a central role in obesity development, but research on treatment options to tackle elevated stress levels in youth with obesity is scarce. The present study examined the impact of the Multidisciplinary Obesity Treatment (MOT; lifestyle intervention including physical exercise, healthy meals, and cognitive behavioral techniques) on physiological stress parameters in youth with obesity and assessed whether adding emotion regulation (ER) training on top of MOT is beneficial. METHODS: From an inpatient treatment center for obesity, 92 youngsters (mean [standard deviation] age = 12.50 [1.66] years, 43.5% boys) were randomly assigned to a control group (MOT) or experimental group (MOT + ER training). Before (T1) and after 12 weeks of treatment (T2), high-frequency heart rate variability (HF-HRV) and heart rate were measured at rest and during a stress induction (= psychophysiological reactivity). RESULTS: At T2, after MOT only, participants displayed a lower resting heart rate ( MT2/T1 = 74.7/78.6) and a reduced stress response (i.e., less decrease in HF-HRV [ MT2/T1 = -0.06/-0.01] and less increase in heart rate [ MT2/T1 = 0.03/0.06] after the stress induction). No further improvements were revealed after adding ER training. However, when considering the weight changes, the significant results in resting heart rate and HF-HRV and heart rate reactivity decreased in the control group, and additional improvements in psychophysiological parameters were discovered in the experimental group. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that MOT may effectively reduce physiological stress responses and also provide preliminary evidence for a potential additional effect of ER training. Further research in a larger sample with extended follow-up measurements is needed.

A closer look at the time course of bodily responses to awe experiences.

The structure and function of awe have been examined by focusing on the average level of outcomes during awe experiences. In the present study, we tested the psychophysiological process of experiencing awe, focusing on time-series changes in skin conductance responses (SCRs), a moment-by-moment measure of sympathetic nervous responses, and pupil diameter, which is dilated or constricted through the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. The responses were measured through an experiment where 77 Japanese university students watched emotional (awe, amusement, or neutral) videos while moving a joystick when they felt supernatural agency or non-agency, examining the underlying psychological processes. We found that experiencing awe was associated with frequent and steep changes in SCRs and frequent changes in pupil diameter. The joystick inclination, the perceptions of the supernatural, was kept at a high level from the start to the end of awe experiences. These results may reflect the psychophysiological processes of awe: the "fluctuation" of the sympathetic nervous system might underlie awe-specific experiences. Our findings shed new light on the mechanisms of the body-mind interaction in awe experiences.

Effects of disliked music on psychophysiology.

While previous research has shown the positive effects of music listening in response to one's favorite music, the negative effects of one's most disliked music have not gained much attention. In the current study, participants listened to three self-selected disliked musical pieces which evoked highly unpleasant feelings. As a contrast, three musical pieces were individually selected for each participant based on neutral liking ratings they provided to other participants' disliked music. During music listening, real-time ratings of subjective (dis)pleasure and simultaneous recordings of peripheral measures were obtained. Results showed that compared to neutral music, listening to disliked music evoked physiological reactions reflecting higher arousal (heart rate, skin conductance response, body temperature), disgust (levator labii muscle), anger (corrugator supercilii muscle), distress and grimacing (zygomaticus major muscle). The differences between conditions were most prominent during "very unpleasant" real-time ratings, showing peak responses for the disliked music. Hence, disliked music has a strenuous effect, as shown in strong physiological arousal responses and facial expression, reflecting the listener's attitude toward the music.

High ventilation breathwork practices: An overview of their effects, mechanisms, and considerations for clinical applications.

High Ventilation Breathwork (HVB) refers to practices employing specific volitional manipulation of breathing, with a long history of use to relieve various forms of psychological distress. This paper seeks to offer a consolidative insight into potential clinical application of HVB as a treatment of psychiatric disorders. We thus review the characteristic phenomenological and neurophysiological effects of these practices to inform their mechanism of therapeutic action, safety profiles and future clinical applications. Clinical observations and data from neurophysiological studies indicate that HVB is associated with extraordinary changes in subjective experience, as well as with profound effects on central and autonomic nervous systems functions through modulation of neurometabolic parameters and interoceptive sensory systems. This growing evidence base may guide how the phenomenological effects of HVB can be understood, and potentially harnessed in the context of such volitional perturbation of psychophysiological state. Reports of putative beneficial effects for trauma-related, affective, and somatic disorders invite further research to obtain detailed mechanistic knowledge, and rigorous clinical testing of these potential therapeutic uses.

Psychophysiological responses of shame in young children: A thermal imaging study.

Shame can be defined as the emotional response to one's violations of rules being exposed to others. However, it is difficult to objectively measure this concept. This study examined the psychophysiological indicators of shame in young children using behavioral methods and thermography, which measures facial temperatures that reflect blood flow changes related to emotions. Four- to six-year-old children participated in an "animal guessing game," in which they lied about having violated a rule. They were assigned to either the exposure or the non-exposure group. In the exposure group, participants' lies were exposed by the experimenter, whereas in the non-exposure group, their lies were not. Results showed that at the behavioral level, participants in the exposure group expressed characteristic behaviors of shame (e.g., embarrassed smiles) more often than those in the non-exposure group. Moreover, the nasal temperatures of participants in the exposure group were higher than those of participants in the other group after the lie was exposed. These results suggest that participants' lies being exposed induced psychophysiological responses and consequently raised their nasal temperature. This finding indicates that psychophysiological responses can enable us to objectively measure higher-order emotions in young children.

Effectiveness of sensory adaptive dental environments to reduce psychophysiology responses of dental anxiety and support positive behaviours in children and young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities: a systematic review and meta-analyses.

BACKGROUND: People with Intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDDs) experience oral health inequality due to myriad of risk factors and complex needs. Sensory processing difficulties, maladaptive behaviours and dental anxiety contribute to difficulties in receiving preventive and routine dental treatments. This study aimed to systematically review the evidence on the effectiveness of sensory adaptive dental environments (SADE) for children and young adults (up to the ages 24 years) with IDD to address cooperation and dental anxiety. METHODS: This review was reported according to The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines. MEDLINE (Ovid), The Cochrane Library, Embase, Google Scholar, Web of Science and OT Seeker were searched using appropriate terms to identify Randomised Control Trails (RCTs) that matched inclusion criteria. Screening was conducted by two reviewers after de-duplication based on titles and abstracts followed by full text retrieval. Quality of the included studies was assessed using Cochrane Risk of Bias (ROB)-2 for crossover trials and data extracted by two reviewers. The details of the interventions and effectiveness were compared and discussed narratively, and comparable outcomes were included to meta-analyses using R software. RESULTS: A total of 622 articles were identified and five articles met eligibility for inclusion. Three studies used multi-sensory adaptations and one used single sensory adaptation of music. Narrative synthesis showed some evidence of SADE reducing magnitude and duration, although, questionable for reducing the number of maladaptive behaviours. Two studies demonstrated conflicting evidence of the effect of SADE on cooperation. Three studies demonstrated significant positive impact of SADE on psychophysiological outcomes. Despite an overall tendency to favour SADE, no statistically significant difference of maladaptive behaviours was found between SADE and regular dental environment (RDE) (Standardised mean change (SMC) = 0.51; 95% Confidence Interval (CI) -0.20 to 1.22; p = 0.161). SADE was superior to RDE (SMC -0.66; 95% CI -1.01 to -0.30; p = < 0.001) in reducing psychophysiological responses of dental anxiety. CONCLUSION: Current evidence suggests that adapting visual, tactile, and auditory aspects of the dental environment in a single or multi-sensory approach demonstrates small positive effects on psychophysiological responses and maladaptive behaviours of dental anxiety for people with IDD. TRIAL REGISTRATION: The title of this review was registered with PROSPERO (CRD42022322083).

The undoing-hypothesis in athletes - three pilot studies testing the effect of positive emotions on athletes' psychophysiological recovery.

Three pilot studies were performed to investigate the undoing-hypothesis (i.e., fast psychophysiological recovery due to positive emotions after stressor) in an athletic sample - after 1) a psychosocial stressor (study 1, N = 19), 2) a physiological stressor (study 2, N = 14), and 3) a simulated competition (study 3, N = 13). Therefore, the effect of positive emotion interventions on cardiovascular (heart rate, blood pressure, heart rate variability) and psychological (perceived positive and negative emotions, arousal, valence) recovery was tested in comparison to neutral interventions. Additionally, study 3 examined the impact on performance after the intervention. Results only confirmed the undoing-hypothesis after a psychosocial stressor (study 1), showing greater increases in perceived positive emotions and a long-lasting decline in diastolic blood pressure after the positive emotion induction compared to the neutral condition. No effects on performance were found. Despite missing significance, descriptive analyzes indicated that our results are in line with the undoing-hypothesis, calling for further research in a greater sample to explore its full potential for athletes. Especially its impact on performance should be examined in future studies.

The use of heart rate variability in esports: A systematic review.

Heart rate variability (HRV) is a psychophysiological measure of particular interest in esports due to its potential to monitor player self-regulation. This study aimed to systematically review the utilisation of HRV in esports. Consideration was given to the methodological and theoretical underpinnings of previous works to provide recommendations for future research. The protocol was made available on the Open Science Framework. Inclusion criteria were empirical studies, examining HRV in esports, using esports players, published in English. Exclusion criteria were non-peer-reviewed studies, populations with pre-existing clinical illness other than Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD), opinion pieces or review papers. In November 2022 a search of Web of Science, PubMed, and EBSCOHost identified seven studies using HRV in esports. Risk of bias was assessed using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool. Narrative review identified two primary uses of HRV in esports; stress response and IGD. A lack of theoretical and methodological underpinning was identified as a major limitation of current literature. Further investigation is necessary before making recommendations regarding the use of HRV in esports. Future research should employ sound theoretical underpinning such as the use of vagally mediated HRV and the robust application of supporting methodological guidelines when investigating HRV in esports.

Facial functional networks during resting state revealed by thermal infrared imaging.

In recent decades, an increasing number of studies on psychophysiology and, in general, on clinical medicine has employed the technique of facial thermal infrared imaging (IRI), which allows to obtain information about the emotional and physical states of the subjects in a completely non-invasive and contactless fashion. Several regions of interest (ROIs) have been reported in literature as salient areas for the psychophysiological characterization of a subject (i.e. nose tip and glabella ROIs). There is however a lack of studies focusing on the functional correlation among these ROIs and about the physiological basis of the relation existing between thermal IRI and vital signals, such as the electrodermal activity, i.e. the galvanic skin response (GSR). The present study offers a new methodology able to assess the functional connection between salient seed ROIs of thermal IRI and all the pixel of the face. The same approach was also applied considering as seed signal the GSR and its phasic and tonic components. Seed correlation analysis on 63 healthy volunteers demonstrated the presence of a common pathway regulating the facial thermal functionality and the electrodermal activity. The procedure was also tested on a pathological case study, finding a completely different pattern compared to the healthy cases. The method represents a promising tool in neurology, physiology and applied neurosciences.