Anxiety symptoms co-occur with cardiovascular health problems, with increasing evidence suggesting the role of autonomic dysfunction. Yet, there is limited behavior genetic research on underlying mechanisms. In this twin study, we investigated the phenotypic, genetic and environmental associations between a latent anxiety factor and three cardiovascular autonomic function factors: interbeat interval (IBI, time between heart beats), heart rate variability (HRV, overall fluctuation of heart-beat intervals) and baroreflex sensitivity (BRS, efficiency in regulating blood pressure [BP]). Multivariate twin models were fit using data of female twins (N= 250) of the Twin Interdisciplinary Neuroticism Study (TWINS). A significant negative association was identified between latent anxiety and BRS factors (r= −.24, 95% CI [−.40, −.07]). Findings suggest that this relationship was mostly explained by correlated shared environmental influences, and there was no evidence for pleiotropic genetic or unique environmental effects. We also identified negative relationships between anxiety symptoms and HRV (r= −.17, 95% CI [−.34, .00]) and IBI factors (r= −.13, 95% CI [−.29, .04]), though these associations did not reach statistical significance. Findings implicate that higher anxiety scores are associated with decreased efficiency in short-term BP regulation, providing support for autonomic dysfunction with anxiety symptomatology. The baroreflex system may be a key mechanism underlying the anxiety–cardiovascular health relationship.

中文翻译：

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女性双胞胎中较高的焦虑程度与较低的心血管自主功能有关


焦虑症状与心血管健康问题同时出现，越来越多的证据表明自主神经功能障碍的作用。然而，对潜在机制的行为遗传学研究有限。在这项双胞胎研究中，我们研究了潜在焦虑因素与三个心血管自主功能因素之间的表型、遗传和环境关联：心跳间隔（IBI，心跳之间的时间）、心率变异性（HRV，心跳间隔的总体波动） ）和压力反射敏感性（BRS，调节血压的效率[BP]）。使用双胞胎跨学科神经质研究 (TWINS) 的女性双胞胎 (N = 250) 的数据拟合多变量双胞胎模型。潜在焦虑与 BRS 因素之间存在显着负相关（r= -.24，95% CI [-.40，-.07]）。研究结果表明，这种关系主要是通过相关的共同环境影响来解释的，并且没有证据表明多效性遗传或独特的环境影响。我们还确定了焦虑症状与 HRV (r= −.17, 95% CI [−.34, .00]) 和 IBI 因素 (r= −.13, 95% CI [−.29, .04]) 之间的负相关关系），尽管这些关联并未达到统计显着性。研究结果表明，较高的焦虑评分与短期血压调节效率降低相关，这为焦虑症状的自主神经功能障碍提供了支持。压力反射系统可能是焦虑与心血管健康关系的关键机制。