Wearables measuring electrodermal activity to assess perceived stress in care: a scoping review

Abstract

Background: Chronic stress responses can lead to physical and behavioural health problems, often experienced and observed in the care of people with intellectual disabilities or people with dementia. Electrodermal activity (EDA) is a bio-signal for stress, which can be measured by wearables and thereby support stress management. However, the how, when and to what extent patients and healthcare providers can benefit, is unclear. This study aims to create an overview of available wearables enabling the detection of perceived stress by using EDA. Methods: Following the PRISMA-SCR protocol for scoping reviews, four databases were included in the search of peer-reviewed studies published between 2012-2022, reporting detection of EDA in relation to self-reported stress or stress-related behaviours. Type of wearable, bodily location, research population, context, stressor type and the reported relationship between EDA and perceived stress were extracted. Results: Of the 74 included studies, the majority included healthy subjects in laboratory situations. Field studies and studies using machine learning to predict stress have increased in the last years. EDA is most often measured on the wrist, with offline data processing. Studies predicting perceived stress or stress-related behaviour using EDA features, reported accuracies between 42%-100% with an average of 82.6%. Of these studies, the majority used machine learning. Conclusion: Wearable EDA sensors are promising in detecting perceived stress. Field studies with relevant populations in a health or care context are lacking. Future studies should focus on the application of EDA-measuring wearables in real-life situations to support stress management.

Circadian-like patterns in electrochemical skin conductance measured from home-based devices: a retrospective study

“…The measure of ESC can be used for the diagnosis of small-fiber neuropathy (SFN), which affects thinly myelinated and unmyelinated small-diameter peripheral nerve fibers mediating sensory or autonomic function. Alteration of thermal or nociceptive sensations and dysautonomia associated with SFN usually results in a negative effect on a patient's quality of life (21)(22)(23)(24). Since the ESC is a direct stimulation and not a recording of arousal stimuli it has been demonstrated For age, the (SD) is also given.…”

What Does Large-scale Electrodermal Sensing Reveal?

“…By measuring this change in electrical potentials across the skin, EDA can be used to track sympathetic nervous system arousal over time, or to compare arousal levels between different people or groups. EDA has been evaluated, to a limited extent, over 24-hour periods [Vieluf et al, 2021, Posada-Quintero and Chon, 2020, Klimek et al, 2023]. Yet, despite its value as an index across psychological science, it is under-studied and under-utilized within long-duration, in-the-wild and population level research because it was unavailable through remotely connected, commodity smart devices.…”

Psychophysiological wellbeing in a class of dental students attending dental school: anxiety, burnout, post work executive performance and a 24 hours physiological investigation during a working day

“…EDA, although extensively validated, is still on the rise for ecological applications outside of lab applications ( Posada-Quintero and Chon, 2020 ; Zhu et al, 2023 ). However, it must be underlined that models for stress detections based on EDA usually reached 82.6% accuracy ( Klimek et al, 2023 ). With limitations of consensus on the threshold adopted and filtering used, there are also some interesting studies that support EDA as the moderator between depression and suicidal ideation in patients with anxiety and depressive symptoms ( Sarchiapone et al, 2018 ; Pruneti et al, 2023 ).…”