Respiratory Variability and Psychological Well-Being in Schoolchildren

Respiratory Variability, Sighing, Anxiety, and Breathing Symptoms in Low- and High-Anxious Music Students Before and After Performing

Music performance anxiety (MPA) is a major problem for music students. It is largely unknown whether music students who experience high or low anxiety differ in their respiratory responses to performance situations and whether these co-vary with self-reported anxiety, tension, and breathing symptoms. Affective processes influence dynamic respiratory regulation in ways that are reflected in measures of respiratory variability and sighing. This study had two goals. First, we determined how measures of respiratory variability, sighing, self-reported anxiety, tension, and breathing symptoms vary as a function of the performance situation (practice vs. public performance), performance phase (pre-performance vs. post-performance), and the general MPA level of music students. Second, we analyzed to what extent self-reported anxiety, tension, and breathing symptoms co-vary with the respiratory responses. The participants were 65 university music students. We assessed their anxiety, tension, and breathing symptoms with Likert scales and recorded their respiration with the LifeShirt system during a practice performance and a public performance. For the 10-min periods before and after each performance, we computed number of sighs, coefficients of variation (CVs, a measure of total variability), autocorrelations at one breath lag (ARs(1), a measure of non-random variability) and means of minute ventilation (V’_E), tidal volume (V_T), inspiration time (T_I), and expiration time (T_E). CVs and sighing were greater whereas AR(1) of V’_E was lower in the public session than in the practice session. The effect of the performance situation on CVs and sighing was larger for high-MPA than for low-MPA participants. Higher MPA levels were associated with lower CVs. At the within-individual level, anxiety, tension, and breathing symptoms were associated with deeper and slower breathing, greater CVs, lower AR(1) of V’_E, and more sighing. We conclude that respiratory variability and sighing are sensitive to the performance situation and to musicians’ general MPA level. Moreover, anxiety, tension, breathing symptoms, and respiratory responses co-vary significantly in the context of music performance situations. Respiratory monitoring can add an important dimension to the understanding of music performance situations and MPA and to the diagnostic and intervention outcome assessments of MPA.

Prediction of Ventricular Tachycardia One Hour before Occurrence Using Artificial Neural Networks

Ventricular tachycardia (VT) is a potentially fatal tachyarrhythmia, which causes a rapid heartbeat as a result of improper electrical activity of the heart. This is a potentially life-threatening arrhythmia because it can cause low blood pressure and may lead to ventricular fibrillation, asystole, and sudden cardiac death. To prevent VT, we developed an early prediction model that can predict this event one hour before its onset using an artificial neural network (ANN) generated using 14 parameters obtained from heart rate variability (HRV) and respiratory rate variability (RRV) analysis. De-identified raw data from the monitors of patients admitted to the cardiovascular intensive care unit at Asan Medical Center between September 2013 and April 2015 were collected. The dataset consisted of 52 recordings obtained one hour prior to VT events and 52 control recordings. Two-thirds of the extracted parameters were used to train the ANN, and the remaining third was used to evaluate performance of the learned ANN. The developed VT prediction model proved its performance by achieving a sensitivity of 0.88, specificity of 0.82, and AUC of 0.93.

Respiratory variability and sighing: a psychophysiological reset model

Whereas respiratory psychophysiological research has mainly studied respiratory time and volume, variability in these parameters has been largely disregarded, even though it may provide important information about respiratory regulation. The present paper reviews the literature on respiratory variability and elaborates on the importance of assessing various components of respiratory variability when studying the interrelationships between emotions and breathing. A model is proposed that predicts specific action tendencies related to emotions to disturb the balance between various respiratory variability components depending on valence by arousal and control dimensions. The central focus of the paper is sighing. The causes and consequences of sighing are reviewed and integrated in the proposed model in which sighing is hypothesized to function as a resetter in the regulation of both breathing and emotions, because it restores a balance in respiratory variability fractions and causes relief.

Positive behavioral intervention in children who were wards of the court attending a mainstream school

This report looked at the effects of treatment using contingency contracts and token economy procedures in three children, two 14 yr. and one 8 yr., who were wards of the court and attending a mainstream school. Students presented problems of adaptation to school, such as making constant noises with the mouth, hands, or pencil on the desk; frequently emitted raucous cries in the classroom; destruction of school resource materials; verbal aggression to classmates and teachers; verbal rejection of all academic work, refusing to do it, making negative comments prior to starting any school activity, in addition to lack of motivation for undertaking school activities. A 4-mo. individual treatment using contingency contracts and token economy behavioral procedures was implemented, with several follow-up sessions. The results indicated an adaptation of behavior to the school environment, confirmed by teachers, significantly reducing the incidence of insults, the destruction of school materials, and indolence during class sessions. These students are at high risk for social exclusion. Interventions have potential social importance in possible prevention of adult criminality, increasing academic achievement, and decreasing social exclusion.

Anxiety and respiratory variability

Associations of inter- and intra-individual differences in anxiety and fear with within subject variability in breathing parameters were explored. Timing and volume components of respiration and FETCO(2) were measured non-intrusively before and during anxious and fearful imagery in 98 young women. Trait anxiety was associated with less variability in several breathing parameters during baseline preceding imagery. Significant decreases in the variability of expiratory time and inspiratory drive were also observed during anxious imagery. During fearful imagery, however, the variability of FETCO(2) increased compared to baseline. Results on anxiety are largely in agreement with models that posit that healthy systems are characterized by variability and flexibility. The paradoxical findings for fearful imagery enhance the importance of a distinction between fearful and anxious affects.