Polyvagal Theory, Sensory Challenge and Gut Emotions

following seven points were listed to summarize the theory.

1. The vagal system does not represent a unitary dimension
2. There are two vagal motor systems
3. In mammals, the concept that vagal tone represents a single or summed system may have
limited physiological or heuristic value.
4. The functional output on the heart by the vagal efferent pathways originating in nucleus
ambiguus may be monitored by RSA.
5. The magnitude of neurogenetic bradycardia is mediated by the dorsal motor nucleus.
6. There is a common cardiopulmonary oscillator.
7. Primary emotions are related to autonomic function.
Additional points, as listed below, embedded in the theory have been discussed and expanded in
several manuscripts (Porges, 1995, 1997, 1998, 2001a, 2003).
1. The phylogenetic development of the neural regulation of the heart.
2. The functional and structural distinction between the vagal efferent pathways originating in
the nucleus ambiguus and the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus.
3. The identification and adaptive function of three phylogenetically-ordered neural circuits
regulating the heart.
4. The application of the Jacksonian principle of dissolution to explain the sequencing of the
response hierarchy.
5. A proposed neural process, neuroception that evaluates risk and modulates vagal output via
higher brain structures.
6. The neuroanatomical and neurophysiological link between the vagal regulation of the heart
and the neural regulation of the striated muscles of the face and head.
7. The important role that physiological state, via afferent feedback to brain structures, has on
reactivity to environmental stimuli.
8. The name polyvagal is used to emphasize the diverse features of the vagus that include
efferents originating primarily from two source nuclei in the brainstem and the prevalence of
afferents.

The vagal brake

Unique to mammals the primary vagal regulation of the heart shifted from the unmyelinated
pathways originating in the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus to include myelinated pathways
originating in the nucleus ambiguus. The myelinated vagus functions as an active vagal brake (see
Porges et al., 1996) in which rapid inhibition and disinhibition of vagal tone to the heart can rapidly
mobilize or calm an individual. The myelinated vagus actively inhibits the sympathetic nervous
systems influences on the heart and dampens hypothalamic-pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis activity
(see Porges, 2001a). Functionally, the vagal brake, by modulating visceral state, enables the
individual to rapidly engage and disengage with objects and other individuals and to promote selfsoothing behaviors and calm states. Developmentally, the number of myelinated vagal fibers
increases linearly from 2428 weeks gestation until full-term birth when the number of fibers is
comparable to those observed in adolescence (Sachis, et al., 1982). In full-term infants, the
myelination process is active during the first year of life, particularly during the first three months
(Pereyra, et al., 1992). Thus, deficits in the regulation of the vagal brake may be causal in deficits in
social communication observed early in development. Basically, the expression of social
engagement behaviors is dependent upon the regulation of visceral state by the vagal brake. If
visceral homeostasis is challenged and the vagal brake is unable to regulate visceral homeostasis,

then social engagement behaviors will be minimized. Thus, it is possible that psychiatric disorders,
(e.g., autism, schizophrenia, reactive attachment disorder) in which compromised social behaviors
are diagnostic features, are associated with neurobiological state regulation strategies that foster
defensive and not social behaviors.

Figure 2
A cartoon illustrating the representation of time in the proposed model of awareness. (a) How a
series of global emotional moments that are indexed across a finite period of present time, from the
past into the anticipated future, can produce a cinemascopic image of the sentient self that is
continuous across a moving window of present time is shown. (b) This structure is depicted during
a period of high emotional salience and arousal, when global emotional moments are rapidly filled
up. The accumulation of global emotional moments produces a subjective dilation of time, and
objective time appears to stand still.

ave you heard about Dr. Stephen Porges' Polyvagal Theory? The theory, already 20 years old,
replaces our old notions of how the sympathetic (fight/flight) and parasympathetic nervous systems
(rest and recuperation) help to keep us calm, alert and safe. The area covered by Polyvagal Theory
is huge. It impacts the way we understand our nervous system, senses, emotions, social self and
behaviors. We see diagnoses like autism, sensory modulation disorder, borderline personality and
others, in a new light.
Polyvagal Theory claims that the nervous system employs a hierarchy of strategies to both regulate
itself and to keep us safe in the face of danger. In fact, it's all about staying safe.
Our "highest" level strategy is a mechanism Porges calls social engagement. It is a phenomenal
system - connecting the social muscles of the face (eyes, mouth and middle ear) with the heart. You
knew that your heart came alive with social interaction, and it's true! This system is regulated
through a myelinated branch of the vagus nerve. In evolutionary terms, this is our most evolved
strategy (mammals only) for keeping ourselves safe. We use this all the time to clear up
misunderstandings, get help, plead for forgiveness, and so on.
The next mechanism, or strategy, is fight or flight. It's regulated by the sympathetic nervous system.
This system is our fall-back strategy when social engagement isn't a good fit. (Think of seeing
someone sneaking up on you!) Note that freeze is not a part of fight or flight.
Our freeze option is primal and is a remnant of our reptilian past. Freeze is a great strategy for
turtles and lizards, but it's usually a bad idea for humans - think of fainting. Therefore, we typically
use it last, when social engagement and fight/flight aren't going to work for us. But there are good
uses for freeze. During severe injury, it shuts us down and turns off our registration of pain. We also
make use of it during sex, and it helps women regulate pain and response to pain during labor.
Now these systems appear to work in tandem. The social engagement system puts the brakes on the
other (fight, flight, freeze) strategies, thus keeping our heart and body active while we work through
a situation. The social engagement system will release the brakes to engage a different response to
the environment (i.e. running) if engagement doesn't help to get us into a safe situation.
What Can Go Wrong
We want our nervous system to operate using the social exchange most of the time. It is our most
evolved way of being. It is restful and healthy because it allows our gut and other organs to do their
job uninterrupted.
However, some of us are programmed from an early age to work from a fight/flight mode. Think of
people who are sensory sensitive and recoil from sound, touch, smell or taste. Think of people with
autism (in this case, the face to heart connection is not working). Think of people with borderline
personality, depression and perhaps other disorders, too. When we are not able to work from our
social engagement strategy, then we revert to a modified fight/flight strategy, which puts us in high
alert. If we use too much of the fight/flight or freeze strategies, we may end up with gut
issues because the gut comes to a halt and we stop digesting food during fight/flight activation.
The Polyvagal Theory has gained great acceptance over the years as pieces of it are shown to
hold under laboratory findings. From a psychological viewpoint, it provides us with a rich
understanding of self-regulation in the body. From a sensory processing viewpoint, it informs our
understanding of sensory modulation.
If you are unfamiliar with the topic, check out the many articles on Dr.Porges' website. The most
comprehensive article is The Polyvagal Perspective, and it is published here on the NIH Public

Access site. It contains the physiological underpinnings of the theory as well as perspectives on
development, emotions, trauma and many other topics. There is a short video of it here.
Sensory Connection
Two researchers looked at a biological marker of the social exchange system, RSA, in typical
children and in children with sensory modulation issues. RSA is the measure of high-frequency
fluctuation in the heart between heart beats. It is a window into the social exchange system. The
researchers found that children with sensory modulation issues have a lower level of RSA than their
peers, meaning that these children are better prepared to put the breaks on social strategies and
instead use fight-or-flight strategies.
As part of the study, the children were (each in turn) given a sensory challenge. The chairs they
were seated on tilted backwards unexpectedly. The level of RSA was monitored in each child
throughout the incident. The RSA of typical children dropped quickly and then stayed low for a
short time. The children with poor sensory modulation skills had a very brief drop of RSA and a
quick rebound to their RSA baseline.
This implies that children with sensory modulation symptoms use different strategies to handle
safety-related situations than their peers. At this time, it is harder to draw greater conclusions since
we do not have an easy-access window into the fight/flight system or the freeze system. With time,
we'll get a better understanding of this. The article can be found here.
Emotions
Perhaps the most interesting new work making use of the Polyvagal Theory is the work of A. D.
(Bud) Craig. Mapping our emotions, this is what he found. (Read about it here.)
Emotions arise from feelings in our organs and gut. The feelings are sent via the vagus nerve to the
Anterior Insular Cortex (AIC) in the brain. (There's a lot going on in the vagus nerve - think of it as
a cable with lots of separate wires.) The AIC captures feelings over time and stores them as
snapshots of feelings. This is our working emotional memory. These feelings are massaged and
integrated with the social exchange to give us both an emotional response to the world around us as
well as a safety-driven strategy.
Think of this: I am relaxing in a lounge chair on the beach. I feel safe. Suddenly, a beach ball hits
me. My fight or flight instinct kicks in and the sympathetic nervous system stops everything
that's happening (i.e. digestion) in my organs and gut. The gut passes the feeling of stoppage as
"alarm" to the brain. This translates in the brain to fear and my body is set in motion. I quickly turn
and see it's a ball and that a child is nearby and smiling at me. My social engagement strategy puts
the breaks on my fight/flight response and also calms my heart. I smile at the child. This sends a
sense of relief to my gut and it in turn sends a "warm" feeling to the AIC. My heart is still pounding
from the surprise, but my response is guided by compassion.
In the above scenario, we specifically looked at a situation with a challenge to safety. But in fact,
we spend much of our time worrying about safety. Unless I am completely safe, listening to quiet
music in a locked room, I will most likely have safety challenges to respond to. The challenge may
be from the scary book I am reading, or from the sense of anxiety I feel when I drop a spoon on the
floor. Almost any activity will involve the combined interaction of the various strategies. The
bottom line: we are constantly adjusting ourselves to meet the world. Polyvagal Theory gives us a
look at how this works.
This is pretty complex stuff - and the theory is still in flux. It changes with each new study that
looks at the implications of Polyvagal Theory on our response to the world. It is going to impact

research greatly in the years ahead. As I mentioned at the beginning, Polyvagal Theory adds a new
dimension to how we see autism, sensory issues and other disorders and will, I think, inform our
interventions for those disorders in a big way.
References:
1. Porges, S. W. (2008, February). The Polyvagal Perspective. NIH Public
Access, PMC1868418
2. Schaaf, R. C., Benevides, T., Blanche, E. I., Brett-Green, B. A., Burke, J. P.,
Cohn, E.S., Koomar, J., Lane, S. J., Miller, L. J., May-Benson, T.A., Parham,
D., Reynolds, S., Schoen, S. A. Parasympathetic Functions in children with
sensory processing disorder. Front Integr Neurosci. 2010; 4: 4. Published
online 2010 March 9. doi: 10.3389/fnint.2010.00004
3. Craig, A. D. (2009). Emotional moments across time: A possible neural
basis for time perception in the anterior insula. Philosophical Transactions
of the Royal Society of London. 364,1933-1942.

Reflexology for the Stressed Gut

Posted by tacyap on Mar 9, 2012 in Reflexology Techniques | Comments Off
Simply put, stress is the sympathetic nervous system in overdrive, and the digestive system is the
most common site of expression of stress related illness. Reflexology can come to the aid by
supporting the parasympathetic nervous system. One simple way to do this is to work with the
vagus nerve reflexes, as mapped on the feet. The vagus nerve is one of the longest of all the
cranial nerves, branching out to form a sort of electrical circuit linking our heart, lungs, and gut to
the brain stem.
There are several reflexes on the feet that relate to digestion, but for simplicity purposes, Ive shown
the reflexes corresponding to the stomach/spleen meridians. While placing your thumb on the
vagus nerve point found on the plantar aspect of the foot, (located directly in the center of the
metatarsalphalangeal joint), choose 4 or 5 digestive reflexes and stimulate each of them, one at a
time.

To do this, apply a small amount of lotion on the foot and with the pad of the thumb, rub one of the
digestive reflexes in an upward movement several times. Continue to hold the vagus reflex point
with the opposite hand, and then go to another digestion reflex area.

Next, stimulate the vagus nerve reflex areas along the plantar surface of the 1st metatarsal, and
along the center of the arch of the foot, medially. Be sure and repeat this on both feet. As with any
reflexology session, its always helpful to work the entire foot while emphasizing particular areas of
concern. The effects of even one session can be immediate. I find reflexology to be particularly
fast and effective in helping with digestion challenges.