Specificity of autonomic arousal to anxiety in children with autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Anxiety is one of the most concerning comorbidities in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) due to its high prevalence, negative impact on physical and psychological well-being, and interaction with core deficits of ASD. Current assessment and treatment of anxiety, which rely on the observation of behavior and self-reports, are often ineffective as ASD is associated with deficits in communication and diminished introspective ability. In this light, autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity has been suggested as a marker of physiological arousal associated with anxiety. However, physiological arousal measured by ANS indices also occurs with other cognitive and emotional processes, and it is unclear whether anxiety-related arousal can be differentiated from that related to other cognitive processes. To address this gap, we investigated the use of linear and nonlinear classification techniques for differentiating anxiety-related arousal from arousal due to three cognitive processes (attention, inhibitory control, and social cognition) and physical activity based on electrocardiography signal features. Our results indicate that over 80% classification accuracy can be achieved, suggesting that ANS response can be used as a specific marker of anxiety-related arousal in a subgroup of children with ASD who demonstrate an increase in heart rate in response to anxiogenic stimuli.

Early developmental pathways to childhood symptoms of attention‐deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and autism spectrum disorder

“…Items on the shyness scale may have detected early‐appearing social atypicalities associated with ASD, such as lack of interest in social interaction, rather than the socially inhibited temperament associated with anxiety. Future work should investigate other markers of anxiety in early life that are more clearly dissociable from ASD, such as physiological arousal measures which have been shown to differentiate between anxiety and ASD symptoms in older children (Chiu, Anagnostou, Brian, Chau, & Kushki, ).…”

How Anxious Do You Think I Am? Relationship Between State and Trait Anxiety in Children With and Without ASD During Social Tasks

“…HR is believed to be influenced by both sympathetic and parasympathetic systems (Benevides & Lane, 2013) and increases in HR across conditions have been found to indicate increased state anxiety (Chiu et al, 2015). High frequency HRV, specifically respiratory sinus arrhythmia, i.e.…”

“…One measure of anxiety often used in lieu of verbal reports or subjective interpretation of behavior involves biophysiological signs of arousal (Chiu et al, 2015; Naveteur & Baque, 1987). However, these measurements only capture physical indicators of “state” anxiety, i.e.…”

The locus coeruleus–norepinephrine system as pacemaker of attention – a developmental mechanism of derailed attentional function in autism spectrum disorder

“…In children with ASD, increased tonic alerting was reported with increased tonic pupil size (Anderson & Colombo, ; Fan et al ., ), lower cardiac parasympathetic activity (Ming et al ., ), lower respiratory sinus arrhythmia with higher heart rate (Bal et al ., ), as well as lack of diurnal variation of saliva alpha‐amylase levels (Anderson et al ., ). Findings were not explained by comorbid anxiety symptoms (Chiu et al ., ).…”