Study finds heartbeat, decision-making link

Everyone feels gut instincts at one time or another: Marry that guy! Don't take that job. Stay inside during this snowstorm! Now, a new study suggests there is indeed a link between your heartbeat and the decisions you make.

"These findings can help explain how we make key choices in life - for example, which house to buy, which job to go for - for better or for worse," explained study author Barnaby D. Dunn, a clinical psychologist who works with the British Medical Research Council's Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, England.

The findings don't indicate that your heart is very good at giving insight into what to do, nor do they point to a way to improve decision making. Still, the study does find evidence that there's something to the idea of trusting your heart.

The researchers tried to find a link between heart and mind by first testing participants to see whether they could estimate how fast their hearts were beating. "Participants are instructed to try to 'feel' their heart internally and not to directly measure their pulse with their fingers," Dunn said. "Only around one-fifth of people show high levels of accuracy."

Researchers then tried to elicit emotions from the participants by showing them photos of happy things and not-so-happy things. They then tried to link people's responses to their ability to monitor their heart rates.

"People's arousal turned out to be related to changes in their heart rate," Dunn said. "And this link was stronger in people who were more aware of their own heartbeat. So how people felt depended in part on how well they could sense the status of their own bodies."

"This suggests that what happens in our bodies really does shape how we feel emotionally," he said.

In a second experiment, the participants played a card game that emphasized intuition. "Some people's gut feelings were spot on, meaning they mastered the game quickly. Others' bodies told them exactly the wrong moves to make, so they learned slowly or never found a way to win," Dunn said. "This link between gut feelings and intuitive decision making was stronger in people who were more aware of their own heartbeat."

What's the connection between heart and brain? Dunn offered one theory: "The 'emotional' parts of the brain generate the bodily response in the first place. The 'rational' parts of the brain then listen in to these bodily responses to find out what the 'emotional' parts of the brain are doing. This allows both logic and emotion to shape our choices."

Dunn said better understanding of the link between the body and the mind might eventually help people who struggle with depression and anxiety.

The study was published in the December issue of Psychological Science.