The beat of social cognition: Exploring the role of heart rate variability as marker of mentalizing abilities

ABSTRACT

There is a long-standing debate on the influence of physiological signals on social behavior. Recent studies suggested that heart rate variability (HRV) may be a marker of social cognitive processes. However, this evidence is preliminary and limited to laboratory studies. In this study, 25 participants were assessed with a social cognition battery and asked to wear a wearable device measuring HRV for 6 consecutive days. The results showed that reduced HRV correlated with higher hostility attribution bias. However, no relationship was found between HRV and other social cognitive measures including facial emotion recognition, theory of mind or emotional intelligence. These results suggest that HRV may be linked to specific social cognitive processes requiring online emotional processing, in particular those related to social threat. These findings are discussed in the context of the neurovisceral integration model.

KEYWORDS:

• Mentalizing
• heart rate variability
• attribution bias
• mHealth

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

LO was supported by the Polish National Centre of Science doctoral stipend [UMO-2015/16/T/HS6/00336] and Foundation for Polish Science Start programme. MC wish to acknowledge the support of the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Mental Health Biomedical Research Centre at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King’s College London.