The Influence of Pain State on Physiological Reactivity of Tension Headache Sufferers

SYNOPSIS
This study compared physiological reactivity to stress of subjects who frequently experience tension headaches and subjects who rarely get headaches. Physiological measures were Frontal and Trapezius muscle tension and Heart Rate. Subjects prone to headaches and subjects not prone to headaches did not differ on any variable, although there was a trend for subjects who were prone to headaches to have the highest Frontal muscle tension levels. For further analyses, subjects prone to headaches were separated into two groups: Subjects with headache during the psychophysiological assessment and subjects who were headache-free during the assessment. Only subjects who were prone to tension headaches and who were actually experiencing a headache at the assessment had significantly higher Frontal muscle tension than controls who were not prone to headaches. These results suggest greater attention needs to be paid to the subjects' current headache state in research on the psychophysiology of headache.