Objective Measurement of Patient’s Dental Anxiety by Galvanic Skin Reaction

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine if anxiety can be measured objectively by skin conductance of a weak electric current. Three measurements were taken. First, a standardized dental-anxiety questionnaire was given to determine anxiety. Second, galvanic skin conductance was measured. Third, polygraph responses were recorded to three key questions from the questionnaire. Questionnaire scores of these key questions were used to create two groups: anxious and not-anxious. The three key questions were subjected to polygraph verification. In the first analysis patients were excluded if the polygraph test disclosed lying on any of the three key questions. The second analysis excluded liars on a question-by-question basis. The third analysis disregarded the polygraph. A statistically significant correlation was found between skin conductance and dental anxiety in all cases. Data seem to indicate that fear of injection is the most anxiety-producing aspect of modern dentistry.

Can galvanic skin conductance be used as an objective indicator of children's anxiety in the dental setting?

“…In accordance with our findings, several studies have shown a relationship between self-reported measures of dental anxiety and skin conductance in adults (10,14,24). It has been shown that in the highly-anxious patients the correlations among scores are stronger.…”

“…The GSR uses psycho-physiological measurements to quantitate levels of anxiety in patients (10). The first step of validation was to compare GSR with the fully recognized scales of anxiety i.e.…”

“…Although skin conductance has mainly been used to evaluate the effect of chronic and acute stressful stimuli, it has also been used in the study of social interaction (12). The results of the two studies in adult patients showed that the skin conductance levels were significantly different in dental patients with stress-inducing stimuli (10,14). Therefore, this study aimed at evaluating the correlation between galvanic skin response (GSR) and two well-established anxiety assessment tools namely the Modified Child Dental Anxiety Scale (MCDAS), and the Clinical Anxiety Rating Scale (CARS) to provide evidence of the validity and reliability of the GSR in pediatric dental patients.…”

“…To overcome these shortcomings, several investigators have used psycho-physiological measurements such as galvanic skin response (GSR) to quantitate levels of anxiety in patients (10). It has been showed that GSR is an extremely accurate objective method and has been used in various studies to measure dental anxiety (11).…”

Fear of Acupuncture Enhances Sympathetic Activation to Acupuncture Stimulation

“…The relationship between emotion and SCR has been investigated in dental research, where a statistically significant correlation was found between SCR and the degree of dental anxiety. 24 It was also reported that high-fear participants responded with significantly larger SCRs during threat periods than low-fear participants. 25 The goal of the present study was to investigate individual differences in the autonomic response to acupuncture stimulation and its relationship to fear of acupuncture, including possible pain and possible adverse events.…”