| Objective. Autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity and memory impairment, as indexed by heart rate, heart rate variability, and neuropsychological measures, respectively, were investigated in children meeting criteria for pediatric bipolar disorder (PEA-BD). Method. Twelve children with PEA-BD (mean age = 10) were compared to 12 children serving as controls (mean age = 11). Both groups included 7 males and 5 females. Physiological data (i.e., heart rate, high frequency (HF) and Low frequency: high frequency ratio (LF:HF) of heart rate variability, and breathing rate) were continuously measured, while word recall performance was evaluated on four occasions across four conditions: baseline (BL), condition one (C1), condition two (C2; stress), condition 3 (C3; recovery). Serial sevens task was employed during the stress condition. Memory functioning was measured by the memory screening index (MSI) of the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning (WRAML). Results . Analysis of variance with repeated measures found no significant difference between groups related to their ANS activity. Alternatively, univariate analyses found significant memory impairment in PEA-BD F (1, 22) = 19.8, p < .01, which was not attributed to level of intelligence. Conclusion. Analogous to previous research, this study found impairment in both verbal and non-verbal memory in children and adolescents meeting criteria for PEA-BD. This study did not support the proposed theory of dysregulated ANS activity in PEA-BD. The current study provides additional evidence of memory impairment in the neurological profile observed in PEA-BD. Implications include improved diagnostic accuracy and psychotherapeutic and psychotropic interventions. |
