title: Mild head injury and sympathetic arousal: investigating relationships with decision-making and neuropsychological performance in university students.
abstract: CONCLUSIONS
  The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between neuropsychological performance, physiological arousal and decision-making in university students who have or have not reported a history of mild head injury (MHI).
  
  
  METHODS
  Forty-four students, 18 (41%) reporting a history of MHI, performed a design fluency task and the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) while electrodermal activity (EDA) was recorded.
  
  
  RESULTS
  General cognitive ability and overall choice outcomes did not differ between groups. However, self-reported MHI severity predicted decision-making performance such that the greater the neural indices of trauma, the more disadvantageous the choices made by participants. As expected, both groups exhibited similar base levels of autonomic arousal and physiological responses to reward and punishment outcomes; however, those reporting MHI produced significantly lower levels of EDA during the anticipatory stages of decision-making.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Overall, these findings encourage the acceptance of head injury as being on a continuum of brain injury severity, as MHI can emulate neurophysiological and neuropsychological features of more traumatic cases and may be impacting mechanisms which sustain adaptive social decision-making.
authors: Neuropsychology Cognitive Research Lab, Department of Psychology, Brock University, 500 Glenridge Ave., St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. sv05lz@brocku.ca
authors: Stefon
authors: S
authors: van Noordt
authors: Dawn
authors: D
authors: Good