Influence of Specific Emotional States on Autonomic Reactivity and Pulmonary Function in Asthmatic Children

Objective: Research relating depression/hopelessness to cholinergic activation suggests the hypothesis that sad emotional states evoke patterns of autonomic reactivity that predispose to cholinergically mediated airway constriction in asthma. A corollary hypothesis is that positive (e.g., happy) emotional states evoke opposing effects. The purpose of the current study is to assess whether specific emotional states (sadness and happiness) can be reliably induced, physiologically differentiated, and related to asthma-relevant physiologic (autonomic) reactivity and pulmonary function in asthmatic children.

Method: Twenty-four children, aged 8 to 17 years, with moderate to severe asthma, viewed the movie E.T., The Extra-Terrestrial while having their heart and respiration rate and oxygen saturation continuously recorded. Specific scenes were identified and preselected to evoke sadness, happiness, and a mixture of happiness and sadness. Self-report of emotion and indices of physiologic response were analyzed for these targeted scenes.

Results: Sadness was associated with greater heart rate variability and instability of oxygen saturation compared with happiness, with mixed results for mixed happiness and sadness.

Conclusion: Results support sadness as evoking patterns of autonomic influence consistent with cholinergically mediated airway constriction. Happiness appears to effect autonomic patterns that would tend to relieve airway constriction.