Oxytocin increases heart rate variability in humans at rest: implications for social approach-related motivation and capacity for social engagement

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial paper looks at Oxytocin.

To examine the effects of OT on HRV measures in healthy male participants while at rest.

Why It Was Studied

Oxytocin (OT) plays a key regulatory role in human social behaviour.

While prior studies have examined the effects of OT on observable social behaviours, studies have seldom examined the effects of OT on psychophysiological markers such as heart rate variability (HRV), which provides an index of individual's motivation for social behaviour.

Who Took Part

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults, men only.

Twenty-one male participants were recruited for this study.

Participants were non-smokers, not on any medications and reported no history of psychiatric illness, neurological disorder, or any other serious medical condition (e.g. diabetes, cardiovascular disease).

How the Study Was Run

The design is described as randomized, placebo-controlled and crossover.

The participants were allocated by chance, so the Oxytocin group and the comparison group should start out alike.

The comparison arm used a placebo, so changes seen with Oxytocin could be set against what happens without it.

In the crossover set-up each of the participants took both Oxytocin and the comparison in turn, acting as their own control.

The study employed a randomised, placebo-controlled, within-subject, crossover, experimental design.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Heart Rate, Motivation, Oxytocin and Social Behavior.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, placebo-controlled and crossover study of Oxytocin.

Its findings take up roughly 6 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2012 (PloS one), a journal based in United States.

More context: the Oxytocin compound page, all human trials.