Title | Autonomic Nervous System Response Patterns of Test-Anxious Individuals to Evaluative Stress. | ||
Author | Bian, Wenjun; Zhang, Xiaocong; Dong, Yunying | ||
Journal | Front Psychol | Publication Year/Month | 2022 |
PMID | 35295398 | PMCID | PMC8918774 |
Affiliation + expend | 1.Department of Psychology, School of Medicine and Holistic Integrated Medicine, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China. |
Test anxiety is a widespread and primarily detrimental emotion in learning and achievement settings. This research aimed to explore the autonomic nervous system (ANS) response patterns of test-anxious individuals in response to evaluative stress. By presenting a standard interview task, an evaluative scenario was effectively induced. Heart rate variability (HRV), a biomarker that can accurately reflect the ANS activity, was used to reflect the physiological responses of 48 high test-anxious subjects and 49 low test-anxious subjects. Results indicate that: (1) both groups show a significantly increased emotional arousal in the evaluative scenario; (2) high test-anxious individuals show a significantly decreased emotional pleasantness in the evaluative scenario, whereas low test-anxious individuals show no significant changes; (3) both groups show a significantly increased low-frequency HRV; (4) high test-anxious individuals show a significantly decreased high-frequency HRV and root mean square of successive heartbeat interval differences (RMSSD), whereas low test-anxious individuals remain stable. These findings suggest that high test-anxious individuals display an increased sympathetic nervous system (SNS) activity and a decreased parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) activity in response to evaluative stress, while low-anxious individuals display an increased SNS activity and a stable PNS activity in response to evaluative stress.