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Heart-Brain Temporal Coupling as a Candidate Biomarker of Self-Congruency
Nicolas Bourdillon1,2, Sébastien Urben3, Nina Rimorini4
1Institute of Sport Sciences, University of Lausanne (UNIL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
Biomedicines
|March 28, 2026
Summary
Higher self-congruency, the alignment of emotions and actions, is linked to stronger heart-to-brain communication. This finding reveals a physiological basis for mental well-being and potential prevention strategies.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Psychology
- Psychophysiology
Background:
- Self-congruency, the coherence between emotional experience and behavior, is crucial for mental health.
- Reduced self-congruency is linked to mental health vulnerability.
- Physiological markers of self-congruency are not well understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate the physiological correlates of self-congruency.
- Examine heart-brain temporal coupling as a marker of psychological coherence.
- Explore the relationship between self-congruency and heart-brain communication.
Main Methods:
- Thirty-eight healthy adults participated in resting-state fMRI with simultaneous cardiac recording.
- Heart rate variability (HRV) was derived from photoplethysmography.
- Heart-brain temporal coupling was quantified using cross-covariance analysis.
Main Results:
- Heart-brain temporal coupling was primarily brain-to-heart, especially in neurovisceral regions like the ventromedial prefrontal cortex.
- Higher self-congruency correlated with stronger heart-to-brain temporal coupling.
- Specific regions involved in emotion regulation showed stronger cardiac temporal ordering with increased self-congruency.
Conclusions:
- Global heart-brain coupling is dominated by top-down neural regulation.
- Enhanced self-congruency is associated with increased bottom-up cardiac temporal ordering.
- Findings suggest a physiological-psychological axis for mental health prevention.
Keywords:
emotion regulationheart rate variabilitymental healthneural dynamics variabilityneurovisceral integration modelself-congruencyMore Related Videos
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