Dysregulated coherence of subjective and cardiac emotional activation in adolescents with internalizing and externalizing problems

School-aged children with higher anxiety symptoms show greater correspondence between subjective negative emotions and autonomic arousal

Individuals exhibit variability in the degree of correspondence between autonomic and subjective indicators of emotional experience. The current study examined whether convergence between autonomic arousal and negative emotions during emotion-inducing story vignettes is associated with internalizing symptoms in school-aged children. A diverse sample of 97 children aged 8 to 12 years participated in this study in which they reported on their anxiety and depression. Children's electrodermal activity was assessed while they read vignettes depicting children experiencing sadness and fear. Participants also reported on their emotional reaction to the vignettes. Children's anxiety and electrodermal activity to fear vignettes were associated only at high levels, but not mean or low levels, of self-reported negative emotions to fear vignettes. These findings suggest that hyperawareness, in which self-reported negative emotionality is high when physiological reactivity is also high, is associated with greater risk for anxiety, but not depression, during middle childhood.

Adolescent stress experience-expression-physiology correspondence: Links to depression, self-injurious thoughts and behaviors, and frontolimbic neural circuity

BACKGROUND

Dysregulated stress responsivity is implicated in adolescent risk for depression and self-injurious thoughts and behaviors (STBs). However, studies often examine levels of the stress response in isolation, precluding understanding of how coordinated disturbance across systems confers risk. The current study utilized a novel person-centered approach to identify stress correspondence profiles and linked them to depressive symptoms, STBs, and neural indices of self-regulatory capacity.

METHOD

Adolescents with and without a major depressive disorder diagnosis (N = 162, Mage = 16.54, SD = 1.96, 72.8% White, 66.5% female) completed the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST), questionnaires, and clinical interviews. Stress experience (self-report), expression (observed), and physiology (salivary cortisol) were assessed during the experimental protocol. Adolescents also underwent a magnetic resonance imaging scan.

RESULTS

Multitrajectory modeling revealed four profiles. High Experience-High Expression-Low Physiology (i.e., lower stress correspondence) adolescents were more likely to report depressive symptoms, lifetime nonsuicidal self-injury, and suicidal ideation relative to all other subgroups reflecting higher stress correspondence: Low Experience-Low Expression-Low Physiology, Moderate Experience-Moderate Expression-Moderate Physiology, High Experience-High Expression-High Physiology. High Experience-High Expression-Low Physiology adolescents also exhibited less positive amygdala-ventromedial prefrontal cortex resting state functional connectivity relative to Moderate Experience-Moderate Expression-Moderate Physiology.

LIMITATIONS

Data were cross-sectional, precluding inference about our profiles as etiological risk factors or mechanisms of risk.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings illustrate meaningful heterogeneity in adolescent stress correspondence with implications for multimodal, multilevel assessment and outcome monitoring in depression prevention and intervention efforts.

Where is emotional feeling felt in the body? An integrative review

Contemporary research on "embodied emotion" emphasizes the role of the body in emotional feeling. The evidence base on interoception, arguably the most prominent strand of embodied emotion research, places emphasis on the cardiac, respiratory and gastrointestinal systems. In turn, interoception has evidence-based links with improved emotion regulation. Despite the focus on separate bodily systems, it is unclear whether particular interoceptive locations play a greater role in emotional feeling and emotion regulation. Further, according to Gross' "process model", the sooner that regulation of an emotion occurs, the better; hence, it is additionally important to identify the first body areas to activate. These issues are investigated in a two-stage integrative review. The first stage was preliminary, giving an overview of the evidence base to highlight the distribution of measured body areas. This indicated that 86% of publications (n = 88) measured cardiac activity, 26% measured the respiratory system, and six percent the gastrointestinal system. Given the emphasis placed on all three systems in interoception theory and research on emotion, this suggests a dearth of comprehensive findings pertaining to feeling locations. The second stage investigated the core issues of where emotional feelings are felt in the body and time-related implications for regulation. This was based on ten texts, which together suggested that the head, throat and chest are the most consistently detected locations across and within numerous emotional contexts. Caution is required, however, since-among other reasons discussed-measurement was not time-restricted in these latter publications, and direct physiological measurement was found in only a minority of cases.

Are Emotions Natural Kinds After All? Rethinking the Issue of Response Coherence

The synchronized co-activation of multiple responses-motivational, behavioral, and physiological-has been taken as a defining feature of emotion. Such response coherence has been observed inconsistently however, and this has led some to view emotion programs as lacking biological reality. Yet, response coherence is not always expected or desirable if an emotion program is to carry out its adaptive function. Rather, the hallmark of emotion is the capacity to orchestrate multiple mechanisms adaptively-responses will co-activate in stereotypical fashion or not depending on how the emotion orchestrator interacts with the situation. Nevertheless, might responses cohere in the general case where input variables are specified minimally? Here we focus on shame as a case study. We measure participants' responses regarding each of 27 socially devalued actions and personal characteristics. We observe internal and external coherence: The intensities of felt shame and of various motivations of shame (hiding, lying, destroying evidence, and threatening witnesses) vary in proportion (i) to one another, and (ii) to the degree to which audiences devalue the disgraced individual-the threat shame defends against. These responses cohere both within and between the United States and India. Further, alternative explanations involving the low-level variable of arousal do not seem to account for these results, suggesting that coherence is imparted by a shame system. These findings indicate that coherence can be observed at multiple levels and raise the possibility that emotion programs orchestrate responses, even in those situations where coherence is low.

Capturing emotion coherence in daily life: Using ambulatory physiology measures and ecological momentary assessments to examine within-person associations and individual differences

While emotion coherence has long been theorized to be a core feature of emotion, to date, studies examining response coherence have been conducted in laboratory settings. The present study used a combined approach of ambulatory physiology measures and ecological momentary assessment conducted over a 4-week period to examine the extent to which emotional experience and physiology show coherence in daily life within-persons; and whether individual differences in response coherence are associated with between-person differences in well-being, negative emotionality, and gender. Results revealed that, on average, individuals exhibited coherence between subjective experience and physiology of emotion, but that there was substantial between-person variation in coherence in daily life. Exploratory analyses revealed no credible link between levels of response coherence and well-being, negative emotionality, or gender. Findings contribute to the literature by demonstrating a novel methodological approach to measuring coherence in daily life and supporting the generalizability of coherence to ecologically valid contexts.

Biocueing and ambulatory biofeedback to enhance emotion regulation: A review of studies investigating non-psychiatric and psychiatric populations

Over the last years, biofeedback applications are increasingly used to enhance interoceptive awareness and self-regulation, in psychiatry and beyond. These applications are used to strengthen emotion regulation skills by home training (ambulatory biofeedback) and real-time support in everyday life stressful situations (biocueing). Unfortunately, knowledge about the feasibility and effectivity of these applications is still scarce. Therefore, a systematic literature search was performed. In total, 30 studies (4 biocueing, 26 ambulatory biofeedback) were reviewed; 21 of these studies were conducted in non-psychiatric samples and 9 studies in psychiatric samples. Study characteristics, biofeedback characteristics, effectivity and feasibility outcomes were extracted. Despite the rapid advances in wearable technology, only a few biocueing studies were found. In the majority of the studies significant positive effects were found on self-reported (stress-related) psychological measures. Significant improvements on physiological measures were also reported, though these measures were used less frequently. Feasibility of the applications was often reported as sufficient, though not adequately assessed in most studies. Taken into account the small sample sizes and the limited quality of the majority of the studies in this recently emerging field, biocueing and ambulatory biofeedback interventions showed promising results. Future research is expected to be focusing on biocueing as a just-in-time adaptive intervention. To establish this research field, closer cooperation between research groups, use of more rigorous as well as individually tailored research designs and more valid feasibility and effectivity assessment are recommended.

Convergence of behavioral and cardiac indicators of distress in toddlerhood: A systematic review and narrative synthesis

The objective of the current study was to systematically review the available literature on the relation between behavioral and cardiac indicators used to measure distress in toddlerhood. After ascertaining the eligibility of 2,424 articles through a Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) and PROSPERO (International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews) guided search process, 22 articles ( N = 2,504) that investigated associations between behavioral and cardiac indicators of distress in toddlerhood were identified. The narrative synthesis described the overall relation (direction [positive, negative], strength [Cohen’s D]) between behavioral and cardiac indicators and was organized by cardiac indicator (i.e., heart rate [HR], heart period, respiratory sinus arrhythmia, pre-ejection period) and type of behavior measured (i.e., coding for expressed emotion behaviors vs. emotion regulation behaviors). Methodological characteristics (i.e., timing of measurement for behavioral and cardiac indicators [concurrent, predictive], length of measurement epochs, inclusion of covariates and moderators) were also described. HR was consistently positively ( D = .05 to .54) related to expressed emotion behaviors. No other cardiac and behavioral indicators were consistently related. Methodological differences related to behavioral and cardiac indicators utilized, timing of measurement, and length of measurement epochs may be responsible for heterogeneity in findings. The findings suggest that researchers might get divergent results depending on whether distress is measured with cardiac or behavioral indicators of distress in toddlerhood. Suggestions for future psychophysiological research with young children are offered.

Right Temporoparietal Junction Involvement in Autonomic Responses to the Suffering of Others: A Preliminary Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Study

Functional neuroimaging studies have emphasized distinct networks for social cognition and affective aspects of empathy. However, studies have not considered whether substrates of social cognition, such as the right temporoparietal junction (TPJ), play a role in affective responses to complex empathy-related stimuli. Here, we used repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to test whether the right TPJ contributes to psychophysiological responses to another person’s emotional suffering. We used a theory of mind functional localizer and image-guided TMS to target the sub-region of the right TPJ implicated in social cognition, and measured autonomic and subjective responses to an empathy induction video. We found evidence that TMS applied at 1 Hz over the right TPJ increased withdrawal of parasympathetic nervous system activity during the empathy induction (n = 32), but did not affect sympathetic nervous system activity (n = 27). Participants who received TMS over the right TPJ also reported feeling more irritation and annoyance, and were less likely to report feeling compassion over and above empathic sadness, than participants who received TMS over the vertex (N = 34). This study provides preliminary evidence for the role of right TPJ functioning in empathy-related psychophysiological and affective responding, potentially blurring the distinction between neural regions specific to social cognition vs. affective aspects of empathy.

Individual Differences in the Association Between Subjective Stress and Heart Rate Are Related to Psychological and Physical Well-Being

The physiological response to stress is intertwined with, but distinct from, the subjective feeling of stress, although both systems must work in concert to enable adaptive responses. We investigated 1,065 participants from the Midlife in the United States 2 study who completed a self-report battery and a stress-induction procedure while physiological and self-report measures of stress were recorded. Individual differences in the association between heart rate and self-reported stress were analyzed in relation to measures that reflect psychological well-being (self-report measures of well-being, anxiety, depression), denial coping, and physical well-being (proinflammatory biomarkers interleukin-6 and C-reactive protein). The within-participants association between heart rate and self-reported stress was significantly related to higher psychological well-being, fewer depressive symptoms, lower trait anxiety, less use of denial coping, and lower levels of proinflammatory biomarkers. Our results highlight the importance of studying individual differences in coherence between physiological measures and subjective mental states in relation to well-being.

Coherence between subjective experience and physiology in emotion: Individual differences and implications for well-being

Emotion theorists have characterized emotions as involving coherent responding across various emotion response systems (e.g., covariation of subjective experience and physiology). Greater response system coherence has been theorized to promote well-being, yet very little research has tested this assumption. The current study examined whether individuals with greater coherence between physiology and subjective experience of emotion report greater well-being. We also examined factors that may predict the magnitude of coherence, such as emotion intensity, cognitive reappraisal, and expressive suppression. Participants (N = 63) completed self-report measures of well-being, expressive suppression, and cognitive reappraisal. They then watched a series of emotionally evocative film clips designed to elicit positive and negative emotion. During the films, participants continuously rated their emotional experience using a rating dial, and their autonomic physiological responses were recorded. Time-lagged cross-correlations were used to calculate within-participant coherence between intensity of emotional experience (ranging from neutral to very negative or very positive) and physiology (composite of cardiac interbeat interval, skin conductance, ear pulse transit time, finger pulse transit time and amplitude, systolic and diastolic blood pressure). Results indicated that individuals with greater coherence reported greater well-being. Coherence was highest during the most emotionally intense film and among individuals who reported lower expressive suppression. However, coherence was not associated with reappraisal. These findings provide support for the idea that greater emotion coherence promotes well-being and also shed light on factors that are associated with the magnitude of coherence. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Adolescent Externalizing Problems: Contributions of Community Crime Exposure and Neural Function During Emotion Introspection in Mexican-Origin Youth

Models of the etiology of adolescent antisocial behavior suggest that externalizing problems may reflect a susceptibility to crime exposure and a diminished capacity for emotion introspection. In this study, adolescents of Mexican origin completed a neuroimaging task that involved rating their subjective feelings of sadness in response to emotional facial expressions or a nonemotional aspect of each face. At lower levels of neural activity during sadness introspection in posterior cingulate and left temporoparietal junction, and in left amygdala, brain regions involved in mentalizing and emotion, respectively, a stronger positive association between community crime exposure and externalizing problems was found. The specification of emotion introspection as a psychological process showing neural variation may help inform targeted interventions to positively affect adolescent behavior.

Interoceptive sensitivity as a proxy for emotional intensity and its relationship with perseverative cognition

Background

Technical advancement in military cyber defense poses increased cognitive demands on cyber officers. In the cyber domain, the influence of emotion on decision-making is rarely investigated. The purpose of this study was to assess psychophysiological correlation with perseverative cognitions during emotionally intensive/stressful situations in cyber military personnel. In line with parallel research on clinical samples high on perseverative cognition, we expected a decreased interoceptive sensitivity in officers with high levels of perseverative cognition.

Method

We investigated this association in a sample of 27 cyber officer cadets.

Results

Contrary to our hypothesis, there was no relationship between the factors.

Discussion

Cyber officers might display characteristics not otherwise found in general populations. The cyber domain may lead to a selection process that attracts different profiles of cognitive and emotional processing.

Emotion dysregulation and autonomic responses to film, rumination, and body awareness: Extending psychophysiological research to a naturalistic clinical setting and a chemically dependent female sample

Substance use is a complex clinical problem characterized by emotion dysregulation and daily challenges that can interfere with laboratory research. Thus, few psychophysiological studies examine autonomic and self-report measures of emotion dysregulation with multidiagnostic, chemically dependent samples or extend this work into naturalistic settings. In this study, we used a within-subject design to examine changes in respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), electrodermal activity (EDA), and self-reported affect across three tasks designed to elicit distinct psychophysiological and emotional response patterns. We also examined emotion dysregulation as a moderator of psychophysiological responses. Participants include 116 women with multiple comorbid mental health conditions enrolled in substance use treatment, many of whom also reported high emotion dysregulation. Participants were assessed in the treatment setting and completed three tasks: watching a sad movie clip, rumination on a stressful event, and a mindful interoceptive awareness meditation. Multilevel models were used to examine changes from resting baselines to the tasks. During the film, results indicate a significant decrease in RSA and an increase in EDA. For the rumination task, participants showed a decrease in RSA but no EDA response. For the body awareness task, there was an increase in RSA and a decrease in EDA. Emotion dysregulation was associated with differences in baseline RSA but not with EDA or with the slope of response patterns across tasks. Self-reported affect was largely consistent with autonomic patterns. Findings add to the literature on emotion dysregulation, substance use, and the translation of psychophysiological measurements into clinical settings with complex samples.

Regulating sadness and fear from outside and within: mothers' emotion socialization and adolescents' parasympathetic regulation predict the development of internalizing difficulties

Multilevel models of developmental psychopathology implicate both characteristics of the individual and their rearing environment in the etiology of internalizing problems and disorders. Maladaptive regulation of fear and sadness, the core of anxiety and depression, arises from the conjoint influences of ineffective parasympathetic regulation of emotion and ineffective emotion socialization experiences. In 171 youths (84 female, M = 13.69 years, SD = 1.84), we measured changes of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) in response to sadness- and fear-inducing film clips and maternal supportive and punitive responses to youths' internalizing emotions. Youths and mothers reported on youths' internalizing problems and anxiety and depression symptoms concurrently and 2 years later at Time 2. Maternal supportive emotion socialization predicted fewer, and punitive socialization predicted more, mother-reported internalizing problems at Time 2 only for youths who showed RSA suppression to fear-inducing films. More RSA suppression to sadness-inducing films predicted more youth-reported internalizing problems at Time 2 in girls only. In addition, less supportive emotion socialization predicted more youth-reported depression symptoms at Time 2 only for girls who showed more RSA suppression to sadness. RSA suppression to sadness versus fear might reflect different patterns of atypical parasympathetic regulation of emotional arousal, both of which increase the risk for internalizing difficulties in youths, and especially girls, who lack maternal support for regulating emotions.

Young children's affective responses to another's distress: dynamic and physiological features

Two descriptive studies set out a new approach for exploring the dynamic features of children’s affective responses (sadness and interest-worry) to another’s distress. In two samples (N_study1 = 75; N_study2 = 114), Kindergarten children were shown a video-vignette depicting another child in distress and the temporal pattern of spontaneous expressions were examined across the unfolding vignette. Results showed, in both study 1 and 2, that sadness and interest-worry had distinct patterns of elicitation across the events of the vignette narrative and there was little co-occurrence of these affects within a given child. Temporal heart rate changes (study 2) were closely aligned to the events of the vignette and, furthermore, affective responses corresponded to distinctive physiological response profiles. The implications of distinct temporal patterns of elicitation for the meaning of sadness and interest-worry are discussed within the framework of emotion regulation and empathy.

A person-centered approach to adolescent emotion regulation: Associations with psychopathology and parenting

Adolescence is a unique period of heightened emotional arousal and still-developing regulatory abilities. Adolescent emotion regulation patterns may be critically involved in adolescents' psychosocial development, but patterns of emotion regulation in youths are not well understood. The current study used latent profile analysis (LPA) to elucidate patterns of emotion expression, experience, and emotion-related physiological arousal in adolescents. A sample of 198 adolescents and their primary caregivers participated in an emotionally arousing parent-adolescent conflict interaction. Adolescents' observed emotion expressions, emotion experiences, and heart rate (HR) and caregiver parenting behaviors were assessed during and/or after the interaction. Parents reported on adolescents' internalizing and externalizing symptoms, and youths reported on depressive symptoms. The LPA revealed four emotion regulation profiles: a moderate HR and high expression profile, a suppression profile (with low negative emotion expression and high emotion experience), a low reactive profile, and a high reactive profile. The moderate HR and high expression profile was associated with lower conduct disorder symptoms, the suppression profile was related to lower anxiety symptoms, and the high reactive profile was associated with higher adolescent depressive symptoms. The high reactive profile and moderate HR and high expression profile were associated with more negative/critical parenting behaviors. Findings suggest that profiles of adolescent emotion regulation can be empirically identified and may be significant risk factors for psychopathology.

Associations between children's video game playing and psychosocial health: Information from both parent and child reports. [corrected]

Healthy emotion regulation is crucial for navigating stressful situations. Interoceptive awareness-the awareness of one's internal states-is important for such healthy regulation. Given the propensity for video games to induce stress, the associations between in-game and real world emotion regulation strategies during duress are worth exploring. We therefore present a method for measuring the interoceptive awareness of negative affect during stressful video game play, and investigate whether individual differences in this ability relate to emotion regulation strategies. Twenty-six proficient video game players were recruited to play a session of the video game Starcraft II in the lab. Players' physiological and subjective states of in-game negative arousal were measured consecutively. A comparison of these measures was used to calculate players' interoceptive awareness of real time in-game arousal. The relation between interoceptive awareness and a suite of emotion regulation strategies was then investigated. We observed a positive relation between in-game interoceptive awareness and the self-reported tendency to actively seek a resolution to negative affect. A positive trend was also observed between interoceptive awareness and the self-reported tendency to seek instrumental social support. Findings are discussed in terms of the relative effectiveness of different emotion regulation strategies for aiding in-game success. We further discuss the benefits and limitations of this pilot testing. In all, we hope to inspire future research into the associations between in-game arousal and emotion regulation strategies used in everyday life.

Autonomic correlates of children's concern and disregard for others

Psychophysiological research on empathy and prosociality in children has focused most often on cardiac activity, heart rate (HR), and HR deceleration in particular. We examined these processes in 7-year-old children during two empathy mood inductions. We independently assessed children's responses to others' distress in two different contexts: structured probes (simulated pain) and maternal interviews. We identified three groups of children who showed either (1) concern for others in distress (i.e., empathy and prosocial behaviors), (2) active disregard (i.e., anger/hostility and antisocial behavior), or (3) passive disregard (i.e., little or no concern). We compared groups on HR and HR deceleration. The active disregard group consistently showed the lowest HR both when groups were based on structured probes and on mothers' reports. Children who showed passive disregard displayed little self-distress during other's distress and different patterns of association of self-distress and HR than the other two groups. Active and passive disregard thus may reflect two different aspects of lack of concern for others. HR deceleration was seen for all three groups, suggesting it is not necessarily a cardiac index of concern for others. Interdisciplinary approaches and multiple-systems analysis are needed to better understand psychobiological substrates.

The neglected role of positive emotion in adolescent psychopathology

Adolescence is a developmental period characterized by elevated stress, heightened risky behaviors, and increases in psychopathology. Emotion dysregulation is a hypothesized contributor to negative outcomes and to the onset of psychopathology during adolescence. However, the dysregulation of negative emotion has been the focus of research while the literature on positive emotion in adolescent psychopathology is limited. This review highlights both the development of normative and dysregulated positive emotion during adolescence. First, the literature on normative adolescent emotional development and on negative emotional regulation is briefly reviewed, followed by a discussion of current theories of positive emotion, which are grounded in the adult literature. From a developmental perspective, the dimension of approach motivation within positive emotion is emphasized throughout and frames the review. This conceptualization guides organization of literatures on normative experiences of positive emotion in adolescence and the role of dysregulated positive emotion in adolescent psychopathology, specifically adolescent depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, externalizing disorders and eating disorders. Last, future directions in the study of adolescent positive emotion and its regulation and the implications of highlighting approach motivation in normative and dysregulated positive emotion in adolescence are detailed.

Allostasis and the development of internalizing and externalizing problems: Changing relations with physiological systems across adolescence

Allostasis, or the maintenance of stability through physiological change, refers to the process by which individuals adjust to the continually changing demands that are put upon somatic activity by salient events. Bauer and colleagues proposed that allostasis could be detected through patterns of the joint reactivity of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis system under stressful conditions. We examined the associations between ANS and HPA reactivity and the development of externalizing and internalizing problems over 2 years in a sample of 215 adolescents. The interactions of ANS and HPA reactivity were contemporaneously associated with, and longitudinally predictive of, adolescents' emotional and behavioral problems. Adolescents with symmetrical high reactivity across systems had more internalizing and fewer externalizing problems initially. Over time, both symmetrical and asymmetrical reactivity predicted increasing internalizing problems in girls, depending on the measure of ANS activity that was examined, heart rate, or blood pressure reactivity. Implications for the understanding of allostasis and the dynamic nature of the relations between multiple physiological regulatory systems and adolescents' developing psychopathology are discussed.