The longitudinal negative impact of early stressful events on emotional and physical well‐being: The buffering role of cardiac vagal development

Abstract

Early stressful events negatively affect emotional and physical well‐being. Cardiac vagal tone (CVT), which is associated with better emotional and physical well‐being, usually gradually increase in early childhood. Nonetheless, children's CVT developmental trajectories are greatly variable, such that CVT can increase or decrease across the years. The present study examines the longitudinal effects of early stressful events and the role of 4 years CVT developmental trajectory on children's emotional and physical well‐being. Forty‐two 4‐year‐old children were enrolled. Number of stressful events and resting electrocardiogram (ECG) were collected at T1. ECG was registered again after one (T2), two (T3) and three (T4) years. Children's emotional and physical well‐being were assessed at T4 through the Child Health and Illness Profile – Child Edition (CHIP–CE). CVT development was calculated as the angular coefficient, reflecting the developmental trajectory of CVT across the four timepoints. Results yielded that higher experienced stressful events predicted poorer emotional and physical well‐being after 4 years. The interaction between the number of stressful events and CVT development emerged on physical well‐being. Early stressful events negatively affect long‐term children's emotional and physical well‐being while a positive CVT development seems to mitigate the negative effects of early stressful events on physical well‐being.

Improvement in parasympathetic regulation is associated with engagement in classroom activity in primary school children experiencing poor classroom climate

“…Previous literature has shown how classroom climate is positively linked with students’ engagement (Wang et al, 2020), yet here we bring evidence that the increase in the ability to self‐regulate can help students to be engaged in classroom activities despite the perception of an emotionally negative classroom climate. Hence, congruently to what has been found in relation to the increase in basal CVT (Patron et al, 2021), a positive change in CVT response to stress seems to be an important protective factor. Future studies should better investigate how a more active adjustment can be beneficial within the classroom, however, even if these data are preliminary, they indicate that next to promoting a positive classroom climate, it can be useful to work on teaching children how to improve their self‐regulatory skills.…”

“…Hence, interventions fostering children's self‐regulation should be promoted in order to support the positive developmental growth of the system's physiological ability to adapt to everyday challenges. Strengthening the ability to restore homeostasis after experiencing a source of stress is functional for student engagement not only in the short (Mastromatteo et al, 2021) but also in the long term (Patron et al, 2021). In addition, we here support the well‐known importance of promoting a positive classroom climate to foster engagement (Berkowitz et al, 2017; Thapa et al, 2013).…”

“…Individual differences in CVT developmental trajectory may be related to the development of different well‐being outcomes. For example, it has been shown that a positive CVT growth works as a protective factor for first and second graders who had experienced early stressful events (Patron et al, 2021). During development, sympathetic and parasympathetic branches go through a maturation process, like several other biological systems that lay the foundation for self‐regulation (Calkins & Keane, 2004).…”

Resilience to stress across the lifespan: Childhood maltreatment, heart rate variability, and bereavement.

“…Other empirical evidence may provide insight into how childhood maltreatment and heart rate variability can interact to predict grief symptoms over time. For example, Patron et al (2020) recently found that high heart rate variability acted as a protective factor among children who experienced a high number of early stressful events. Specifically, among children who experienced a higher number of early stressful events, a positive cardiac vagal tone development trajectory was associated with better physical well-being.…”

Conscientiousness and perceived physical symptoms: Mediating effect of life events stress and moderating role of resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia

“…from 2:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.) in order to minimize the circadian effects on the physiological measures (e.g. O’Súilleabháin et al, 2017; Patron et al, 2020; Tyra et al, 2020). Upon arrival, participants were given several minutes to acclimate to the laboratory environment.…”