Single Slow-Paced Breathing Session at Six Cycles per Minute: Investigation of Dose-Response Relationship on Cardiac Vagal Activity.

Min You,Maša Iskra,Fabrice Dosseville,Nina Zammit,Sylvain Laborde,Uirassu Borges

doi:10.3390/ijerph182312478

Abstract

The practice of slow-paced breathing (SPB) has been linked to a range of positive outcomes, such as decreasing symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress, as well as increasing well-being. Among the suggested mechanisms of action, SPB has been shown to increase cardiac vagal activity (CVA). The present study aimed to investigate whether there is a dose-response relationship modulating the effects of SPB on CVA. A total of 59 participants were involved in this study. In a within-subject design, participants attended the lab five times, and realized SPB at six cycles per minute with different durations (5, 10, 15, and 20 min), as well as a control condition without SPB. CVA was indexed via the root mean square of successive differences (RMSSD). During SPB, findings showed an increase in RMSSD in all conditions compared to the control condition. However, no differences were found in RMSSD among the different session durations, during SPB or during the resting measurement completed immediately after SPB. Noteworthily, session duration showed an influence on the spontaneous respiratory frequency in the resting measurement occurring immediately after SPB. Specifically, respiratory frequency appears to decrease with session duration, thus potentially contributing to additional relaxing effects.

Highlights

Slow-paced breathing (SPB), the voluntary slowing down of respiratory frequency (RF), is linked to a range of positive mental and physical health outcomes, such as decreased depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms [1,2,3]
That the different aforementioned mechanisms could all be related to some extent to the central autonomic network [19] and to the neurovisceral integration model [17,18], which may provide an explanation for the relationship between SPB and cardiac vagal activity (CVA) increases
The effects of SPB on other physiological variables may persist longer, given that the spontaneous respiratory frequency measured at rest after SPB was found to be lower than before

Summary

Introduction

Slow-paced breathing (SPB), the voluntary slowing down of respiratory frequency (RF), is linked to a range of positive mental and physical health outcomes, such as decreased depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms [1,2,3]. Different parameters have been found to differentially influence the effectiveness of SPB, for example, the inhalation/exhalation ratio. A longer exhalation in relation to inhalation was found to trigger more psychophysiological benefits [4,5,6]. Another aspect which has not yet received researchers’ attention to date is the dose-response relationship. Whether the duration of SPB influences its psychophysiological effects. Investigating the dose-response ( called exposureresponse) relationship is a typical approach to explore the effectiveness of interventions and treatments [7]. The aim of this paper is to address the dose-response relationship regarding the duration of a single SPB session

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Discussion

Conclusion