Individual Differences in Ability to Control Heart Rate: Personality, Strategy, Physiological, and Other Variables

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Abstract
Three experiments (total N = 102) are reported which examined the relationship between individual differences in ability to control heart rate (HR) with feedback and differences in self‐reported cognitive strategies, personality variables (locus of control, state and trait anxiety), physiological variables (respiration, somatic activity, basal HR and HR variability, and initial ability to control HR without feedback), and several auxiliary variables (e.g., weight, smoking, gender, exercise, and meditation). Two sets of analyses were performed. In the first set, differences in cognitive strategies and physiological concomitants between HR decrease and HR increase were studied revealing disparate patterns of cognitive strategies and physiological concomitants for the two directions of HR control. In the second set, the group of cognitive, strategy, personality, physiological, and auxiliary variables was searched to determine if any variables were related to individual differences in ability to decrease or increase HR. Cognitive strategies, personality, and auxiliary variables were generally unrelated to ability to control HR in either direction. Use of two cognitive strategies was found to be associated with lack of ability to increase HR, and non‐smokers were better able to decrease HR. Strong relationships were found for somatic activity and ability to control HR without feedback, both of which successfully predicted differences in ability to decrease and increase HR with feedback. Implications of these findings for past and future studies of voluntary control of HR are discussed.