title: Interoceptive dimensions across cardiac and respiratory axes.
abstract: Interoception refers to the sensing of signals concerning the internal state of the body. Individual differences in interoceptive sensitivity are proposed to account for differences in affective processing, including the expression of anxiety. The majority of investigations of interoceptive accuracy focus on cardiac signals, typically using heartbeat detection tests and self-report measures. Consequently, little is known about how different organ-specific axes of interoception relate to each other or to symptoms of anxiety. Here, we compare interoception for cardiac and respiratory signals. We demonstrate a dissociation between cardiac and respiratory measures of interoceptive accuracy (i.e. task performance), yet a positive relationship between cardiac and respiratory measures of interoceptive awareness (i.e. metacognitive insight into own interoceptive ability). Neither interoceptive accuracy nor metacognitive awareness for cardiac and respiratory measures was related to touch acuity, an exteroceptive sense. Specific measures of interoception were found to be predictive of anxiety symptoms. Poor respiratory accuracy was associated with heightened anxiety score, while good metacognitive awareness for cardiac interoception was associated with reduced anxiety. These findings highlight that detection accuracies across different sensory modalities are dissociable and future work can better delineate their relationship to affective and cognitive constructs.This article is part of the themed issue 'Interoception beyond homeostasis: affect, cognition and mental health'.
authors.affiliation: Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK s.garfinkel@bsms.ac.uk.|Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Sarah N
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Garfinkel
authors.affiliation: Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Miranda F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Manassei
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Giles
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Hamilton-Fletcher
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Yvo
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: In den Bosch
authors.affiliation: Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.|Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, Brighton, UK.
authors.forename: Hugo D
authors.initials: HD
authors.lastname: Critchley
authors.affiliation: Psychiatry, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK.|Institute for Medical Sociology, Medical Faculty, Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany.
authors.forename: Miriam
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Engels
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001364:Awareness; D004739:England; D005260:Female; D006339:Heart Rate; D006801:Humans; D065812:Interoception; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D056152:Respiratory Rate; D055698:Touch Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: anxiety; body perception; interoception; mindfulness; respiration; somatosensory