The SNS response decrement obtained by Mefferd and Wieland (1965) when a congitive task was imposed during a painful stimulus was reproduced with 15 Ss under conditions involving minimal motor activity. The results support the conclusion that cognitive activity/»er se was the major determinant of the decrement.After a decrease caused by alerting the S for the first passage no further significant changes in BSR occurred. The mean GSR (sum of transient decreases in resistance adjusted to a per minute basis) increased from .99 kilohms during the baseline period to 3.78 kilohms during the passage alone (two-tailed t test, p < 0.01) and to 6.60 kilohms during the cold pressor. Immediately after the passage was imposed on the cold pressor the GSR decreased, and the mean for the period was 4.00 kilohms-a significant decrease from the cold pressor period (p < 0.01, two-tailed t test). These results are the same as those obtained in our earlier study. They support the conclusion that the key determinant of the response decrement was not the motor activity of work association, and demonstrate that the results can be generalized to a larger population.

Sympathetic activity (SA) was reduced when a cognitive task was imposed during an ongoing response to cold pressor. However, this reduction effect was not obtained when CP was imposed 40‐sec after the onset of a cognitive task. Rather the response level appeared to be about that which would have been obtained from cold pressor alone. These results suggest that the reduction found in the former situation is not the result of distraction due to cognitive activity per se, as we had previously proposed, but it is the initial SA resulting from presentation of the cognitive task that causes the interaction. This suggests that the competition occurs at a level below that of cognition.

Galvanic skin responses (GSRs) were measured on 12 male Ss under four conditions: rest, reaction time measurements, a cold pressor, and a combination of cold pressor and reaction time measurements. Both reaction time measurements alone and cold pressor alone caused increased sympathetic activity, but when the former was combined with cold pressor the ongoing autonomic activity was depressed.

Date Presented 3/30/2017 Adults with autism have impairments in autonomic nervous system regulation that impact their ability to engage socially and perform functional tasks. This study tested the efficacy of a sensory-based technology, the Vayu Vest, as a means of altering autonomic arousal and increasing performance. Primary Author and Speaker: Stacey Reynolds Additional Authors and Speakers: Shelly Lane Contributing Authors: Brian Mullen, Caitlin Boulware, Holly Timberline, Michelle Norris, Caitlin McDaniel, Kaitlyn Baumann, Anthony Guarriello