Oxytocin effects on resting-state heart rate variability in women: The role of childhood rearing experiences

Schoormans, Dounya; Kop, Willem J.; Kunst, Laura E.; Riem, Madelon M E

doi:10.1016/j.cpnec.2020.100007

Cited by 10 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…Moreover, our results match the interpretations by Riem et al ( 2021 ), attributing altered HRV after oxytocin administration to an increased attentional salience as induced by the social presence during the experiment. Concerning the interactive effects with early trauma, in accordance to our results, childhood trauma did not modulate IN-OT on salivary oxytocin in male adolescents (Fragkaki et al 2020 ) and HRV was unaffected by IN-OT in individuals with adverse childhood experiences (Schoormans et al 2020 ). Matching the conclusions as initially drawn by Herpertz and Bertsch ( 2015 ), IN-OT might, therefore, be more suited in improving BPD associated symptoms/mechanisms (including disturbed vagal activity) in the context of social interactions with and attachment to familiar people (e.g., before seeing a psychotherapist).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…In contrast to our results, intranasal administration of oxytocin has been found to enhance baseline HRV in male HC (Norman et al 2011;Kemp et al 2012) as well as in a male clinical sample (Martins et al 2020). As recent studies point to a pattern of interactive effects with childhood trauma and attachment insecurity (Schoormans et al 2020;Riem et al 2021), we conducted exploratory analysis (hypothesis 4) but found no significant interaction of neither childhood trauma, attachment insecurity nor clinical group with oxytocin on RMSSD at rest. In contrast, it has been suggested that oxytocin is involved in attachment security and that methylation of the oxytocin receptor may be involved in the epigenetic modulation of childhood trauma (see Brüne 2016 for a review).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 92%

“…As we only measured ECG for 4 min, and did not control for breathing artifacts, we decided to rely on a relatively robust, single indicator of HRV (e.g., RMSSD, Penttilä et al 2001;Quintana et al 2016). The interpretations concerning the lacked oxytocin effect should be treated with caution: Most studies which found an effect of IN-OT on resting HRV relied on male individuals (Norman et al 2011;Kemp et al 2012), and those studies on females controlled for menstrual cycle (Schoormans et al 2020), which we did not. Therefore, possible effects of oxytocin on HRV in females with BPD might eventually be present, as a function of menstrual cycle.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Reduced vagal activity in borderline personality disorder is unaffected by intranasal oxytocin administration, but predicted by the interaction between childhood trauma and attachment insecurity

et al. 2022

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Individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) show self-regulatory deficits, associated with reduced heart-rate variability (HRV). However, results on reduced HRV in BPD remain heterogeneous, thus encouraging the search for developmental constructs explaining this heterogeneity. The present study first examined predictors of reduced resting-state HRV in BPD, namely the interaction between self-reported adult attachment insecurity and childhood trauma. Second, we investigated if alterations in resting-state HRV are modified by intranasal oxytocin administration, as oxytocin may enhance HRV and is implicated in the interaction between childhood trauma and disturbed attachment for the pathogenesis of BPD. In a randomized, placebo-controlled trial, 53 unmedicated women with BPD and 60 healthy controls (HC) self-administered either 24 I.U. of oxytocin or placebo and underwent a 4-min electrocardiogram. Our results replicate significantly reduced HRV in women with BPD, explained up to 16% by variations in childhood trauma and attachment insecurity. At high levels of acute attachment insecurity, higher levels of childhood trauma significantly predicted reduced HRV in BPD. However, our results do not support a significant effect of oxytocin on mean HRV, and no interaction effect emerged including childhood trauma and attachment insecurity. Our findings highlight a complex interaction between reduced vagal activity and developmental factors in BPD.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Reduced vagal activity in borderline personality disorder is unaffected by intranasal oxytocin administration, but predicted by the interaction between childhood trauma and attachment insecurity

et al. 2022

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“…We also measured HR and HRV responses in both resting-state and task-based conditions and showed no significant effects of OT on these two indices in the two conditions. These findings thus lend support for a null effect of OT on these two parasympathetic indices (54–56), although findings in this field are controversial given differences of within-vs. between-subject design and administered dosages of OT (57,58). The absence of effects of OT on HR also helps exclude the possible confounding effect of the HR on IAc in the HCT (26,59,60).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 66%

Intranasal oxytocin improves interoceptive accuracy and heart-beat evoked potentials in a cardiac interoceptive task

Zhou,

Cheng,

Zhou

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Background. Interoception represents perception of the internal bodily state which is closely associated with social/emotional processing and physical health in humans. Understanding the mechanism underlying interoceptive processing, particularly its modulation, is thus of great importance. Given overlap between oxytocinergic pathways and interoceptive signaling substrates in both peripheral visceral organs and the brain, intranasal oxytocin administration is a promising approach for modulating interoceptive processing. Methods. In a double-blind, placebo-controlled, between-subject design, 80 healthy male participants were recruited to perform a cardiac interoceptive task during electroencephalograph (EEG) and electrocardiograph (ECG) recording to examine whether intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin can modulate interoceptive processing. We also collected data in a resting state to examine whether we could replicate previous findings. Results. Results showed that in the interoceptive task oxytocin increased interoceptive accuracy at the behavioral level which was paralleled by larger heartbeat-evoked potential amplitudes on the neural level. Heartbeat-evoked potential amplitudes were found to be positively correlated with interoceptive accuracy across groups. However, there were no significant effects of oxytocin on EEG or ECG during resting-state. Conclusions. These findings suggest that oxytocin may only have a facilitatory effect on interoceptive processing during task-based conditions. Our findings not only provide new insights into the modulation of interoceptive processing via targeting the oxytocinergic system but also provide proof of concept evidence for the therapeutic potential of intranasal oxytocin in mental disorders with dysfunctional interoception.

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“…As such, the functional role of delta-beta CFC corresponds well to the demonstrated role of OXT in modulating social cognition/ motivation and emotion [1,41,42]. For peripheral vagal/ parasympathetic markers of OXT effects the most studied are altered heart rate variability (HRV) from the electrocardiogram (ECG) and skin conductance response (SCR) [27,36,[43][44][45][46], although gastrointestinal effects of intravenous OXT have also been reported [47] and thus alterations in electrogastrogram (EGG) activity might also reflect vagally-mediated effects.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sniffing oxytocin: Nose to brain or nose to blood?

et al. 2023

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In recent years ample studies have reported that intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin can facilitate social motivation and cognition in healthy and clinical populations. However, it is still unclear how effects are mediated since intranasally administered oxytocin can both directly enter the brain (nose to brain) and increase peripheral vascular concentrations (nose to blood). The relative functional contributions of these routes are not established and have received insufficient attention in the field. The current study used vasoconstrictor pretreatment to prevent intranasal oxytocin (24 IU) from increasing peripheral concentrations and measured effects on both resting-state neural (electroencephalography) and physiological responses (electrocardiogram, electrogastrogram and skin conductance). Results demonstrated that intranasal oxytocin alone produced robust and widespread increases of delta-beta cross-frequency coupling (CFC) from 30 min post-treatment but did not influence peripheral physiological measures. As predicted, vasoconstrictor pretreatment greatly reduced the normal increase in peripheral oxytocin concentrations and, importantly, abolished the majority of intranasal oxytocin effects on delta-beta CFC. Furthermore, time-dependent positive correlations were found between increases in plasma oxytocin concentrations and corresponding increases in delta-beta CFC following oxytocin treatment alone. Our findings suggest a critical role of peripheral vasculature-mediated routes on neural effects of exogenous oxytocin administration with important translational implications for its use as an intervention in psychiatric disorders.

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Oxytocin effects on resting-state heart rate variability in women: The role of childhood rearing experiences

Cited by 10 publications

References 18 publications

Reduced vagal activity in borderline personality disorder is unaffected by intranasal oxytocin administration, but predicted by the interaction between childhood trauma and attachment insecurity

Reduced vagal activity in borderline personality disorder is unaffected by intranasal oxytocin administration, but predicted by the interaction between childhood trauma and attachment insecurity

Intranasal oxytocin improves interoceptive accuracy and heart-beat evoked potentials in a cardiac interoceptive task

Sniffing oxytocin: Nose to brain or nose to blood?

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