Measuring diurnal biorythms

Measuring biological change in real-time is important for behavioural economics, particularly when linked to mood and decision-making data. A number of the papers and ongoing projects in our research group requires the ability to do this (some recent papers here here and here ). We also conducted a pilot project in June 2008 looking at producing stress maps for Dublin (http://www.stressmapping.com/index.html ).

The Economist has an article recently looking at the use of new devices to quantify daily bio and mood rhythms.

Below are some useful links to devices that we are looking at in terms of adding them to ongoing research projects. Suggestions very welcome. I will use this post to put up some updates.

1. Suunto Heart Rate Monitors are used in training and sports.

2. The Bodymedia sensewear device measures GSR, among other things, and is worn as an armband

3. The affectiva device measures GSR in real-time

4. mybasis.com is promising to deliver a device that allows heart rate to be tracked from a wrist-device. This would be very useful as the chest-straps can be awkward for study participants.

5. Camntech offers another heart-rate device: "chest-worn monitoring device that records heart rate, Inter-Beat-Interval (IBI), and physical activity in one combined, light-weight waterproof unit. It is designed for capturing HRV data and for calculating and measuring Activity Energy Expenditure."

6. Featured in the Economist article, ginger.io, offers a platform for passive and active recording of real-time data mainly in healthcare settings.

Innovative methodology: Taking field potentials into the field (with pigeons)

The Journal of Neurophysiology runs an innovative methodology section which does exactly what it says on the tin, my favourite article so far: Miniature Neurologgers for Flying Pigeons: Multichannel EEG and Action and Field Potentials in Combination With GPS Recording

Making this methodology work with humans is the focus of much Intel supported neuro research in Trinity and UCD at the moment...

Personality and the consequences of social interaction for affect repair

Abstract
This study explores the interaction of extraversion and social interaction on affect repair. Following a negative affect induction, participants engaged in a neutral discussion task alone or in the presence of a pleasant and supportive confederate. Results reveal that extraversion predicted affect repair in the solitary condition with extraverts (vs. introverts) experiencing a greater enhancement of positive affect. In the social condition, extraversion did not predict repair; all individuals benefited from the interaction. Thus, when alone, introverts demonstrated a maladaptive affect repair profile that was abated in the presence of a supportive individual. Other results reveal that the social condition produced the largest affect repair. These findings suggest that, while extraverts exhibit more effective affect repair when alone, pleasant interaction facilitates affect repair for all individuals (even introverts).

The Day Reconstruction Method coupled with personality measures will demonstrate how such relationships operate in a real-world setting.

Augustine et al. (2008)

Measurement of personality as expressed in everyday life

To examine the expression of personality in its natural habitat, the authors tracked 96 participants over 2 days using the Electronically Activated Recorder (EAR), which samples snippets of ambient sounds in participants’ immediate environments. Participants’ Big Five scores were correlated with EAR-derived information on their daily social interactions, locations, activities, moods, and language use; these quotidian manifestations were generally consistent with the trait definitions and (except for Openness) often gender specific. To identify implicit folk theories about daily manifestations of personality, the authors correlated the EAR-derived information with impressions of participants based on their EAR sounds; judges’ implicit folk theories were generally accurate (especially for Extraversion) and also partially gender specific. The findings point to the importance of naturalistic observation studies on how
personality is expressed and perceived in the natural stream of everyday behavior.

Personality in Its Natural Habitat

This is an interesting study but huge resources would be needed to code the daily interactions manually. Voice activated, rather than periodic recordings, coupled with software which could identify different voices could produce a simple measure of daily interaction frequency, duration, interaction partners. Accompanied with measures of voice loundnesss and perhaps tone, this may be a more feasible alternative for incorporating verbal behaviour into large scale studies.

Assessment of biological function in psychosocial research on health

In this chapter entitled "Tools of psychosocial biology in health care research" Andrew Steptoe outlines the main types biological measurements which should be included in psychosocial research on health. The review points to the importance of "non-specific biological markers of stress-related activation or resistance to disease". Biological measures which fall into this category include: (1) neuroendocrine factors such as cortisol, the steroid hormones DHEA and DHEA sulphate, the catechlomines adrenaline and noradrenaline, and insulin-like growth factor and gonadal hormones such as testosterone and oestrogen, (2) cardiovascular measures such as blood pressure (author recommends self-measurement as a more cost-effective alternative to ambulatory monitoring systems), and measures of heart rate variability, (3) measures of inflammation such as C-reactive protein, fibrinogen and the proinflammatory cytokines IL-6 and tumour necrosis factor a (TNFα), (4) measures of immune function such as T cells, cytotoxic T cells, B cells, natural killer cells can be made via blood or saliva sample, (5) musculoskeletal problems which can be assessed via self-report, physical examination, or through surface electromyography (EMG). Sweat gland activity and forced respiratory volume are also discussed in brief. Steptoe also suggests that combining biological measures with mental stress testing and naturalistic monitoring is a useful advance in evaluating the extent to which individual differences in acute stress reactivity generalize to everyday life situations.

see also Psychobiological Processes: Pathways Linking Social Factors with Disease a presentation by Steptoe which includes a model of where brain, neuroendocrine, autonomic and immune responses fit into the relationships between social structure various other factors (work, social environment, genes, health behaviours) and well-being.