Vagal regulation during bottle feeding in low-birthweight neonates: Support for the gustatory-vagal hypothesis

• Published in: Developmental psychobiology Vol. 30; no. 3; pp. 225 - 233
• Main Authors: Portales, A. Lourdes, Porges, Stephen W., Doussard-Roosevelt, Jane A., Abedin, Mehnur, Lopez, Richard, Young, Michal A., Beeram, Madhava R., Baker, Michelle
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01-04-1997
• Subjects: Electrocardiography; feeding; Feeding Behavior; Heart Rate; heart rate variability; Humans; Infant, Low Birth Weight; Infant, Newborn; low birthweight; neonates; respiratory sinus arrhythmia; Taste - physiology; vagal tone; Vagus Nerve - physiology
• ISSN: 0012-1630; 1098-2302
• DOI: 10.1002/(SICI)1098-2302(199704)30:3<225::AID-DEV5>3.0.CO;2-R

The gustatory‐vagal hypothesis proposes that gustatory stimulation elicits a coordinated vagal response manifested as an increase in ingestive behaviors (e.g., sucking) and a decrease in nucleus ambiguus vagal tone measured by decreases in the amplitude of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA). The current study tested the gustatory‐vagal hypothesis in a bottle feeding paradigm with 29 clinically stable, high‐risk, low‐birthweight neonates. The amplitude of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) was collected before, during, and after bottle feeding. Consistent with the gustatory‐vagal hypothesis, RSA decreased during bottle feeding. In a longitudinal subsample of subjects, the pattern of RSA changes during the feeding paradigm was stable across two test sessions. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 30: 225–233, 1997