A low resting heart rate in late adolescence is
associated with increased risk for violent
criminality in men later in life, according to a new
study published online in the journal JAMA
Psychiatry.
Low resting heart rate (RHR) has been viewed either
as an indicator of a chronically low level of
psychological arousal, which may lead some people to
seek stimulating experiences, or as a marker of
weakened responses to aversive and stressful
stimuli, which can lead to fearless behaviour and
risk taking.
However, not much is known about RHR as a predictor
of severe violence. A better understanding of
individual-level biological risk factors in the
cause of violence could help prevention and
intervention efforts.
Antti Latvala, Ph.D., of the Karolinska Institutet,
Stockholm, and the University of Helsinki, Finland,
and coauthors examined the association of RHR in
late adolescence to predict violent criminality
later in life using data on 710,264 Swedish men born
from 1958 to 1991 with up to 35.7 years of
follow-up.
RHR and blood pressure were measured at mandatory
military conscription testing when the men were an
average age of 18 years old.
There were 40,093 men convicted of a violent crime
during nearly 12.9 million person-years of
follow-up.
The researchers found that compared with 139,511 men
with the highest RHR (greater than or equal to 83
beats per minute), the 132, 595 men with the lowest
RHR (less than or equal to 60 beats per minute) had
a 39 percent higher chance of being convicted of
violent crimes and a 25 percent higher chance of
being convicted of nonviolent crimes when the
analysis models accounted for an assortment of
variables.
"Our results confirm that, in addition to being
associated with aggressive and antisocial outcomes
in childhood and adolescence, low RHR increases the
risk for violent and nonviolent antisocial behaviors
in adulthood," the authors conclude.
For more information
A Longitudinal Study of Resting Heart Rate and
Violent Criminality in More Than 700,000 Men
Antti Latvala, Ralf Kuja-Halkola, Catarina Almqvist,
Henrik Larsson, Paul Lichtenstein,
JAMA Psychiatry, published online September 09,
2015.
doi:10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2015.1165
MDN |