Cardiovascular responses to orthostasis were similar for the two groups. However, the alcoholics had blunted heart-rate responses to public speaking even though they reported similar anxiety responses to the nonalcoholics. This suggests a disconnection between perception of threat and resulting physiological responses among the alcoholics.
"The similar cardiovascular responses to orthostasis among the alcohol-dependent patients indicate that their autonomic nervous systems were working normally," said Lovallo. "Yet when we asked them to prepare and memorize a short speech and then deliver the speech to a video camera, the patients reacted with little or no change in heart rate, and of course, they failed to have a cortisol response. The patients reacted as if the social challenge of public speaking had no special meaning for them. So, the sympathetic nervous system in the patients looked normal, but their response to a psychological stressor was almost absent. When faced with a socially meaningful stressor, neither part of their fight-flight mechanism was working."
"Emotion is the product of cognitive and physiological processes," observed Ralph E. Tarter, professor of pharmaceutical sciences and psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh. "Although speculative, the results of this study point to a physiologic-cognitive disconnection as a potential mechanism underlying the disturbed emotional experience of alcoholics. For example, although speculative, it could perhaps help explain why alcoholics appear outwardly unconcerned about their alcoholism when in fact their life is chaotic. This is commonly referred to as 'denial.' However, we need further
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17-Jun-2002