Different profiles of decision making and physiology under varying levels of stress in trained military personnel

Abstract

Decision making is one of the most vital processes we use every day, ranging from mundane decisions about what to eat to life-threatening choices such as how to avoid a car collision. Thus, the context in which our decisions are made is critical, and our physiology enables adaptive responses that account for how environmental stress influences our performance. The relationship between stress and decision making can additionally be affected by one's expertise in making decisions in high-threat environments, where experts can develop an adaptive response that mitigates the negative impacts of stress. In the present study, 26 male military personnel made friend/foe discriminations in an environment where we manipulated the level of stress. In the high-stress condition, participants received a shock when they incorrectly shot a friend or missed shooting a foe; in the low-stress condition, participants received a vibration for an incorrect decision. We characterized performance using signal detection theory to investigate whether a participant changed their decision criterion to avoid making an error. Results showed that under high-stress, participants made more false alarms, mistaking friends as foes, and this co-occurred with increased high frequency heart rate variability. Finally, we examined the relationship between decision making and physiology, and found that participants exhibited adaptive behavioral and physiological profiles under different stress levels. We interpret this adaptive profile as a marker of an expert's ingrained training that does not require top down control, suggesting a way that expert training in high-stress environments helps to buffer negative impacts of stress on performance.

Relationships Between Heart Rate Variability, Occupational Performance, and Fitness for Tactical Personnel: A Systematic Review

“…Three study design methodologies were utilized in the selected studies. Quasi-experimental studies ( 27 – 29 ) and case-control studies ( 30 , 31 ) represented a total of four included studies. All other studies were of a cohort design.…”

Effect of Stress on Autonomic and Cardiovascular Systems in Military Population: A Systematic Review

“…In the cases where a single task was analysed [10,11,13,15,16,19,20,22,23], data collection was performed during 2 occasions of the selected task, i.e., before and during/after. One of the studies monitored stress during four consecutive days, finding higher stress after a simulated air accident manoeuvre, with questionnaire and HRV analysis [17].…”

“…One of the studies monitored stress during four consecutive days, finding higher stress after a simulated air accident manoeuvre, with questionnaire and HRV analysis [17]. Regarding the acute stress responses in the parameters measured, a reduction in high-frequency HRV with a concurrent increase in low-frequency HRV was identified [14,15,19,20,22,23]. Moreover, experienced soldiers presented lower HR values during a stressful situation [10,13,16] compared to their less experienced counterparts, or no significant changes after a parachute jump [11].…”

Bolstering Cognitive Resilience via Train-the-Trainer Delivery of Mindfulness Training in Applied High-Demand Settings

“…These cognitive functions are critical for performance and psychological health as well (e.g., Blacker et al 2018;Hofmann et al 2012). As such, their degradation may result in grave performance errors (Gamble et al 2018;Wilson et al 2015), as well as increased susceptibility to psychological illness (Marx et al 2009;Vasterling et al 1998).…”