Cardiac and Electrodermal Responses to Threats: Modulation by Childhood Sexual Abuse History

Abstract

Background

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is associated with significant negative lifelong consequences for physical and mental health. However, the impact of CSA history on danger perception and response has been understudied. In this study, we explored how autonomic reactivity to threats is influenced by the history of CSA in a nonclinical sample.

Methods

Participants were undergraduate students with no current diagnosis of cardiovascular disease or mental disorders. After exclusion criteria were applied, the sample consisted of 135 participants. Among these 135 participants, 48 (mean age, 20.43 years; SD, 3.07; 9 men) reported having experienced significant CSA (CSA group), and 87 (mean age, 20.89 years; SD, 4.99; 30 men) reported not having had such experiences (non-CSA group). The participants viewed trauma-unrelated threatening or neutral pictures while their skin conductance response and heart rate data were collected.

Results

Compared with the neutral pictures, when viewing trauma-unrelated threatening pictures, the non-CSA group presented bradycardia, which is a typical cardiac response upon exposure to negative images. In contrast, the CSA group presented a blunted cardiac response. Furthermore, we observed an overrepresentation of skin conductance nonresponders in the CSA group.

Conclusions

Taken together, these findings suggest that youth who are exposed to CSA seem to have blunted autonomic responsiveness to threats. This blunted responsiveness is an atypical pattern that may represent a biomarker of many unfavorable physiological and psychological outcomes.