Standardized mental stress in healthy volunteers induced by delayed auditory feedback (DAF)

Using delayed auditory feedback (delay 0.175 s) a standardized form of mental stress was investigated in 8 healthy male volunteers. After a resting period and a period of undelayed reading, the volunteers were exposed for 5 min to the DAF stress. During the DAF period heart rate increased by 10% and systolic and diastolic blood pressure increased by 9% and 18%, respectively. As a measure of acute sympathetic activation, plasma concentrations of norepinephrine and epinephrine rose by 68% and 49%, respectively. The activity od dopamine-beta-hydroxylase in plasma was increased by 25%. From these results it can be concluded that the DAF procedure provides a suitable method for inducing a standardized mental stress in normal subjects, which can be measured as changes in biochemical and cardiovascular variables.