Réactivité physiologique et conscience intéroceptive dans les troubles anxieux pédiatriques : une revue conceptuelle et empirique

Objectives: This review summarizes data relative to objective and subjective measures of body responses in children and adolescents with anxiety.
Methods: We reviewed 24 studies measuring (1) cardiac responses and (2) interoceptive processes in children and adolescents with anxiety.
Results: Anxious children and adolescents generally do not differ from their non-anxious peers on their cardiac parameters and objective physiological reactivity to stressful events but some results suggest reduced autonomic flexibility in pediatric anxiety related to chronic anxiety. Moreover, anxiety does not alter interoceptive accuracy, but youths with anxiety misinterpret the intensity and the visibility of their symptoms.
Conclusions: Interoception is biased in pediatric anxiety. Further studies are needed to provide information about the role of perceptual, attentional, and interpretative processes underlying these biases, as well as to determine the respective influence of anxiety type and symptoms intensity.