http://m.adc.bmj.com/content/early/2014/02/26/archdischild-2012-301863.full
This (paywalled) article on the archives website, by Corinne Rees, raises interesting questions about the role of autonomic dysfunction in functional disorders, in mediating anxiety, and in sustaining the link between early adverse experience and later psychopathology.
The problem is the authors obvious emotional investment in the importance of the ANS. It reads like an opinion piece, not a careful review of the evidence. There’s passionate advocacy of the ANS’s importance, but little discussion of the fact that it’s dysfunction could have other causes itself, be they physical or psychological. Indeed, the fact that the ANS is so difficult to define is not mentioned. Finally, although patient and parent reports are of course important, to reproduce these reports uncritically in a review article, without research corroboration, may raise a few eyebrows.
Nonetheless, this is an essential read, whether you 100% agree or not.