INTRODUCTION TO VAGAL TONE Vagal - Referring to the action of the vagus nerve; the 10th cranial nerve, which

relays information between the brainstem and most of the internal organs. one - !n this conte"t it means something similar to #tension#. one is a term commonly used to refer to systems in continuous and $artial states activity, such as #arterial tone# or #muscle tone#. hus, vagal tone is the continuous, chronic, $assive activity of the vagus nerve. %s the vagus nerve is a central com$onent in the $arasym$athetic nervous system &'()*, in a research conte"t vagal tone refers to the level of activity of the '(). he '() is res$onsible for the #resting state# actions of the autonomic nervous system &%()*, that is, the branch of the nervous system which controls bodily functions which are beneath conscious control + heart rate, digestion, salivation, $u$illary diameter etc. !n healthy $eo$le high levels of $arasym$athetic activity are desirable; this is indicative of a state of calmness, rest or rela"ation, which is a sign that the body is re$airing itself. ,i-ewise, there are a very long list of $hysical and $sychological illnesses where $arasym$athetic activity is reduced + heart disease to de$ression, an"iety, mood and conduct disorders, etc. !t also $redicts health outcomes + better $rognosis is $redicted by high vagal tone in $eo$le who are recovering from heart attac-s, for instance. Vagal tone cannot be directly measured. !t is technically incorrect to refer to an e"$eriment as measuring vagal tone; instead, measurements of related systems are ta-en which re$resent the o$erationalisation of vagal tone. .e -now in general that increases vagal tone both slows the heart and ma-es the heart rate more variable + i.e. there is more beat-to-beat change between heart beats. his is due to res$iratory sinus arrhythmia &R)%*. R)% is the $henomenon where inhalation tem$orarily su$$resses vagal activity &and thus immediately increases heart rate* and e"halation immediately decreases /R as vagal activity resumes &and decreases /R*. )o, while we may not measure vagal tone, we may measure changes in the heart rate which are due to R)%. his is done by measuring $eriodic changes in the /R due to breathing + this is called heart rate variability &/RV*. &.here R)% is actually from is a su$remely com$licated 0uestion. !f you have a strong $hysiology bac-ground %(1 you#re e"tremely brave, see- out the 'oint23ounter$oint by 4c-berg and 5arema-er 67ournal of %$$lied 'hysiology, 8009: + and $re$are to be confused.* %t $resent, there are about ;0 $ublished methods of 0uantifying /RV. /owever, the vast ma<ority of studies use only a few of the available measurements. =ost common is high-fre0uency /RV, a measurement of the amount of variability there is in cycles between 0.1>h? and 0.;h? &that is, between 8.> sec and @.A seconds + the s$eed of ty$ical breathing*. =easurements of /RV are widely used in $sychological, biomedical and $hysiological research. here are several reasons for thisB 1* hey do not suffer from many -inds of e"$erimental bias, in the same way verbal res$onses or 0uestionnaires do. 8* /R is a very easy measure to ta-e and record, com$ared to other $hysiological techni0ues - 44C or f=R! data es$ecially. =easuring /R has a very low lead time &the amount of time between a $artici$ant arriving and e"$erimental recording starting* and is almost free. .e now also have e"cellent free software for calculating /RV indices.

D* 3hanges in the heart occur both immediately &within a few seconds* in the $resence of interesting, shoc-ing or attentionally-ca$turing stimuli, but also over long $eriods of time in different mood states &over several minutes* and over 8;-hour slee$2wa-e cycles. his is a much more convenient latency than neuroendocrine or inflammatory changes, which are less immediate. ;* Eecause of the associated theories, we have a good idea what changes in /RV re$resent and they allow us to draw conclusions about the co-activation of $hysiological and $sychological systems. >* =ost im$ortantly for e"$erimental wor- in social $sychology, we can ta-e heart rate at the same time as social situations are occurring without destroying their face validity or interfering with the tas-. !t is im$ossible to act #naturally# in an f=R! scanner + you are wearing a hos$ital gown, cram$ed, lying down and immobileF hey are also e"tremely noisy and remove the $ossibility of face-to-face interaction. /owever, there are some significant $rofessional and technical challenges to /RV data collection and usageB 1* 1ata collection and analysis is fre0uently $oorly handled. /aving broad access to a research method is a very good thing in general, but it also inevitably means that non-e"$erts use the method &and often use it badly*. )ee your lecture notes for much more on this. 8* /RV $rovides information about the autonomic nervous system, and fre0uently $sychological researchers have a $oor understanding of the interface between social2emotional2$ersonality characteristics and the body. his is not their fault + no-one e"$ects $eo$le to have two careers. !t does mean, however, $sychologists wor-ing in the area should develo$ either a strong bac-ground in autonomic $hysiology, or collaborate with another author who does when $erforming /RV research. D* he e"istence of so many different ways of /RV being calculated means unethical researchers may attem$t to com$are behavioural data to several of these different analyses and then $icmeasures which dis$lay significance rather than using the commonly acce$ted metrics. !t is $ossible to <ustify the use of almost any of the available measures + they have all been em$loyed somewhere. his is a big $roblem, but than-fully can usually be identified when $a$ers are reviewed + it is usually at least somewhat obvious to an outside reader when measures are incorrectly a$$lied. ;* )im$ly $ut, the area of research is very, very bigF !t s$ans on one side most of autonomic, res$iratory and circulatory $hysiology and on the other side, the entirety of the human communicative, regulatory and $sychological systems. !t#s often too big for us to fully gras$ the im$lications of our wor-.

EXAMPLES IN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY hese are a few abstracts attached here that will give you a good idea of <ust how broadly we can connect a* social $rocesses and b* /RV. Gou should most definitely chase down one or more of the below and read the whole studies... that will give you the best idea of how /RV information is used in different conte"ts related to social $sychology.

Psychosocial factors a ! h"art rat" #aria$ility i h"althy %o&" ' Horst" "t al( Psychoso&atic M"!ici "( )*** HE743 !V4B his study was conducted to investigate associations between $sychosocial ris- factors, including social isolation, anger and de$ressive sym$toms, and heart rate variability in healthy women. =4 /H1)B he study grou$ consisted of D00 healthy women &median age >A.> years* who were re$resentative of women living in the greater )toc-holm area. Ior the measurement of social isolation, a condensed version of the !nter$ersonal )u$$ort 4valuation ,ist was used and household si?e assessed. %nger was measured by the anger scales $reviously used in the Iramingham study and de$ressive sym$toms by a 0uestionnaire derived from 'earlin. /ealth behaviors were measured by means of standard 0uestionnaires. Irom 8;-hour ambulatory electrocardiogra$hic monitoring, both time and fre0uency domain measures were obtainedB )1(( inde" &mean of the )1s of all normal to normal intervals for all >-minute segments of the entire recording*, V,I $ower &very low fre0uency $ower*, ,I $ower &low fre0uency $ower*, /I $ower &high fre0uency $ower*, and the ,I2/I ratio &low fre0uency by high fre0uency ratio* were com$uted. R4)J, )B )ocial isolation and inability to relieve anger by tal-ing to others were associated with decreased heart rate variability. 1e$ressive sym$toms were related only to the ,I2/I ratio. %d<usting for age, meno$ausal status, e"ercise and smo-ing habits, history of hy$ertension, and E=! did not substantially change the results. 3H(3,J)!H()B hese findings suggest heart rate variability to be a mediating mechanism that could e"$lain at least $art of the re$orted associations between social isolation, su$$ressed anger, and health outcomes. I ci!" c" of arrhyth&ias a ! h"art rat" #aria$ility i %il!+ty," rats "-,os"! to social str"ss S.oifo "t al( A/P + H"art( )**0 'sychological stressors of different natures can induce different shifts of autonomic control on cardiac electrical activity, with either a sym$athetic or a $arasym$athetic $revalence. %rrhythmia occurrence, R-R interval variability, and $lasma catecholamine elevations were measured in male wild-ty$e rats e"$osed to either a social stressor &defeat* or a nonsocial challenge &restraint*. 4lectrocardiograms were telemetrically recorded, and blood sam$les were withdrawn through <ugular vein catheters from normal, freely moving animals. 1efeat $roduced a much higher incidence of arrhythmias &mostly ventricular $remature beats*, which were mainly observed in the @0-s time $eriods after attac-s. he social challenge also induced a much stronger reduction of average R-R interval, a lower R-R interval variability &as estimated by the time-domain $arameters standard deviation of mean R-R interval duration, coefficient of variance, and root mean s0uare of successive differences in R-R interval duration*, and higher elevations of venous $lasma catecholamines com$ared with restraint. hese autonomic and2or neuroendocrine data indicate that a social stressor such as defeat is characteri?ed by both a higher sym$athetic activation and a lower $arasym$athetic antagonism com$ared with a nonsocial restraint challenge, which results in a higher ris- for ventricular arrhythmias. A alysis of Physiolo.ical R"s,o s"s to a Social Sit1atio i a I&&"rsi#" Virt1al E #iro &" t Slat"r "t al( Pr"s" c"( 2334 %n e"$eriment was conducted in a 3ave-li-e environment to e"$lore the relationshi$ between

$hysiological res$onses and brea-s in $resence and utterances by virtual characters towards the $artici$ants. wenty $eo$le e"$lored a virtual environment &V4* that de$icted a virtual bar scenario. he e"$eriment was divided into a training and an e"$erimental $hase. 1uring the e"$erimental $hase brea-s in $resence &E!'s* in the form of whiteouts of the V4 scenario were induced for 8 s at four e0ually s$aced times during the a$$ro"imately > min in the bar scenario. %dditionally, five virtual characters addressed remar-s to the sub<ects. 'hysiological measures including electrocardiagram &43C* and galvanic s-in res$onse &C)R* were recorded throughout the whole e"$eriment. he heart rate, the heart rate variability, and the event-related heart rate changes were calculated from the ac0uired 43C data. he fre0uency res$onse of the C)R signal was calculated with a wavelet analysis. he study shows that the heart rate and heart rate variability $arameters vary significantly between the training and e"$erimental $hase. C)R $arameters and event-related heart rate changes show the occurrence of brea-s in $resence. 4vent-related heart rate changes also signified the virtual character utterances. here were also differences in res$onse between $artici$ants who re$ort more or less socially an"ious. 5ro tal $rai "l"ctrical asy&&"try a ! car!iac #a.al to " ,r"!ict $ias"! att" tio to social thr"at Mis6o#ic a ! Sch&i!t( I t"r atio al /o1r al of Psycho,hysiolo.y( 23)3 !ndividual differences in attention biases for motivationally significant stimuli have been re$orted in clinical and normative $o$ulations. Iew studies, however, have attem$ted to e"amine $otential biological mechanisms underlying differences in the cognitive $rocessing of emotional stimuli. he $resent study e"amined the e"tent to which two well-validated $sycho$hysiological vulnerability mar-ers of affective style 6i.e., frontal electroence$halogram &44C* asymmetry and cardiac vagal tone: $redicted biased attention toward ra$id $resentations & 8>0 ms* of angry and ha$$y facial e"$ressions. .e found that right frontal 44C asymmetry and low cardiac vagal tone, ta-en together, $redicted a$$ro"imately DAK of the variability in attentional vigilance for angry faces. Irontal 44C asymmetry and cardiac vagal tone did not $redict attention for ha$$y faces, inde$endently of each other. Hur results $rovide $reliminary evidence that two well established $sycho$hysiological indicators of affective style bias early $rocessing of motivationally salient stimuli.