Abstract
BackgroundMusical performance is a skilled activity performed under intense pressure, thus is often a profound source of anxiety. In other contexts, anxiety and its concomitant symptoms of sympathetic nervous system arousal have been successfully ameliorated with HRV biofeedback (HRV BF), a technique involving slow breathing which augments autonomic and emotional regulatory capacity. Objective: This randomised-controlled study explored the impact of a single 30-minute session of HRV BF on anxiety in response to a highly stressful music performance.MethodsA total of 46 trained musicians participated in this study and were randomly allocated to a slow breathing with or without biofeedback or no-treatment control group. A 3 Group×2 Time mixed experimental design was employed to compare the effect of group before and after intervention on performance anxiety (STAI-S) and frequency domain measures of HRV.ResultsSlow breathing groups (n = 30) showed significantly greater improvements in high frequency (HF) and LF/HF ratio measures of HRV relative to control (n = 15) during 5 minute recordings of performance anticipation following the intervention (effect size: η2 = 0.122 and η2 = 0.116, respectively). The addition of biofeedback to a slow breathing protocol did not produce differential results. While intervention groups did not exhibit an overall reduction in self-reported anxiety, participants with high baseline anxiety who received the intervention (n = 15) displayed greater reductions in self-reported state anxiety relative to those in the control condition (n = 7) (r = 0.379).ConclusionsThese findings indicate that a single session of slow breathing, regardless of biofeedback, is sufficient for controlling physiological arousal in anticipation of psychosocial stress associated with music performance and that slow breathing is particularly helpful for musicians with high levels of anxiety. Future research is needed to further examine the effects of HRV BF as a low-cost, non-pharmacological treatment for music performance anxiety.
Highlights
The work environment of professional musicians can be a stressful world of extreme highs and lows [1,2] often leading to pre-performance anxiety [3] and post-performance depression [2,4]
We demonstrate that a short slow breathing intervention increases Heart Rate Variability (HRV), and, amongst highly anxious participants, reduces anxiety
HRV BF was administered on Resilience Builder HRV biofeedback software (Innate Intelligence, www.i-i.com.au/RB/index.html), run on an Acer Aspire 1 ZG5 laptop connected via USB to a finger pulse sensor
Summary
The work environment of professional musicians can be a stressful world of extreme highs and lows [1,2] often leading to pre-performance anxiety [3] and post-performance depression [2,4]. Performance anxiety (PA) has a disproportionate effect on musicians [5], with estimates of prevalence ranging from 15% to 59% [6,7,8,9]. Physiological symptoms such as tremors, raised heart rate (HR) [10], dry mouth and hyperventilation [11] and cognitive symptoms, including an inability to concentrate [3], interfere with a musician’s ability to perform to the highest possible standard [10] precisely when they need it the most [3]. Inability to perform due to anxiety can lead to missed opportunities and loss of income. Objective: This randomised-controlled study explored the impact of a single 30-minute session of HRV BF on anxiety in response to a highly stressful music performance
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