Cardiac vagal tone and sustained attention in school‐age children

Abstract

Three hypotheses tested relationships between cardiac responses mediated via the vagus and sustained attention in a population of normal school-age children. These hypotheses addressed the theoretical relationships among resting cardiac vagal tone (using the Porges estimate of respiratory sinus arrhythmia, V), performance measures of sustained attention, and cardiac reactivity during sustained attention. Thirty-two fourth and fifth grade children performed a continuous performance task while their electrocardiograms were monitored. Children with higher resting levels of V performed better on the first 3-min block of the continuous performance task. Additionally, levels of V were significantly reduced across the blocks of the 9-min task for all children. No relationships were found between resting levels of V and change in either V or heart period during task performance. These findings support two of the three hypotheses proposed by Porges regarding individual differences in cardiac vagal tone and sustained attention.

Future Directions in Emotion Dysregulation and Youth Psychopathology

“…Rather, externalizing scores in this range more likely reflect temperamental exuberance, positive affectivity, social competence, and adaptive engagement with the environment (see Degnan et al, 2011). Of importance, across numerous studies, these very traits have been associated with modest RSA withdrawal to emotion evocation and attention demanding tasks (e.g., Marcovitch et al, 2010;Richards, 1987;Suess, Porges, & Plude, 1994). To summarize, measures that were designed to assess psychopathology do not capture problematic behavior among those who fall within normal population ranges.…”

“…However, because the PNS is a final common pathway between CNS responding and many behavioral responses, what might appear to be identical PNS responses can originate from different neural systems. Attempts to link externalizing behavior and RSA reactivity have been conducted using many stimulus conditions, including emotion evocation (e.g., Beauchaine et al, 2001), attention allocation (e.g., Suess et al, 1994), executive function (e.g., Marcovitch et al, 2010), positive mood induction (e.g., Fortunato et al, 2013), and others. Some authors also average RSA scores across a variety of unrelated lab tasks that undoubtedly evoke different CNS responses.…”

Prenatal cocaine and other substance exposure: Effects on infant autonomic regulation at 7 months of age

“…Optimally, the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems should act in concert such that when sympathetic arousal (measured by HR in this study) increases in response to environmental challenge, there should be a decrease in parasympathetic activity (measured by RSA). This negative change in RSA from baseline to environmental challenge is associated with more optimal state regulation in infancy (DeGangi et al, 1991), decreased behavior problems in preschool-aged children (Porges, Doussard-Roosevelt, Portales, & Greenspan, 1996), and more adaptive behavior during attention and affect eliciting tasks in both preschool and school-aged children (Calkins, 1997;Suess, Porges, & Plude, 1994), and during social approach (Stifter & Corey, 2001). Thus, the measurement of change in RSA from baseline to challenging situations is an important concurrent and predictive index of parasympathetic regulation in infants.…”

Facilitating Emotional Self-Regulation in Preschool Children: Efficacy of the Early HeartSmarts Program in Promoting Social, Emotional and Cognitive Development

“…In contrast, increased vagal tone (associated with high parasympathetic activity) has been associated with increased physiological and behavioral flexibility, responsiveness to the environment, stress resiliency and emotion regulation ability (Porges, 1992;Porges et al, 1994). Evidence suggests that high vagal tone also enhances attentional capacity, an aspect of cog-nition central to learning (Richards, 1987;Suess et al, 1994). The implications are that psychophysiological states, such as coherence, that naturally enhance parasympathetic activity should play an important positive role in children's development of effective emotion regulation, healthy social behavior and optimal cognitive function (Schore, 2003).…”