Polyvagal Science
Chapel Hill, NC
Team Name:
POLYVAGAL SCIENCE
Team Leader Name:
Stephen Porges, Ph.D.
Location:
Chapel Hill, NC
Contact:
http://www.polyvagalscience.com
Approach:
Vagal Afferents
Affiliation:
Polyvagal Science, LLC, Chapel Hill, NC
Link:
Team Leader Bio:
Dr. Porges is Professor of Psychiatry at the University of North Carolina. He is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where he directed the Brain-Body Center, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Maryland, where he chaired the Department of Human Development and directed the Institute for Child Study. He served as president of the Society for Psychophysiological Research and President of the Federation of Behavioral, Psychological, and Cognitive Sciences. He is a former recipient of a National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Development Award. His research on heart rate variability spans almost five decades of continuous NIH funding during which he investigated neural mediators, developed new technologies to monitor and quantify, and studied clinical populations. He is the first scientist to quantify heart rate variability and to document its sensitivity and resilience to environmental challenges. In 1994 he proposed the Polyvagal Theory, a theory that links the evolution of the mammalian autonomic nervous system to social behavior and emphasizes the importance of physiological state in the expression of psychiatric disorders. He is the author of The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation (Norton, 2011).