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By Emilian Dobrescu
Fear seems to be a negative word, but if we look at the past, we can easily find many important advantages regarding this concept. Cutting the story short, our reaction to fear stimuli has helped us for thousands of years, because without a response system any human being would have probably been a great dinner for every single animal, as we would treat any creature like a harmless kitty. However, we have survived so this fact gives us a clue about a possible relation between our brain as our body principle, and the fears.
Do we have butterflies in our stomach?
Definitely NO. But we can state that we feel them. So why do we have this sensation? Well, when we encounter fear stimuli, our response system is triggered and it starts a very powerful chain of processes in order to protect us. One important measure that our brain takes, because it chairs this response system, is to redirect the blood within our body. Basically, it forwards a great amount of blood to our muscles in order to be prepared to act, but this amount is taken out from somewhere and because of that, our brain chooses the organs that do not have any impact on our defense system such as organs which provide the digestive function or the reproductive function. Here comes the answer to our initial question, because our tummy is part of our digestive system the blood is removed to an extent from it and in that moment as the disposal is sudden, we feel those butterflies.
How does our brain trigger the defense system?
In our brain, we have two managers who make decisions. The first one, let’s call it the red manager, makes unconscious decisions which are made very quickly after we perceive the fear stimulus. Then we have a blue manager who is not as fast, but it also has a really significant impact when it comes to our way to behave after we encounter the stimulus. The blue manager is more analytical as he looks at the situational context. For example, if we would meet a lion when we are in a safari trip and it comes closer to us our red manager will trigger almost instantly some processes in our body in order to be ready to defend ourselves, but if we see the same lion at the zoo, our blue manager will give feedback to the red one, perhaps saying something like this: “Hey, bro stop that craziness, it’s no danger here!”. During our evolution we developed an ability to learn not just from our personal experience, but also from others, so if a parent says to the children “Stay far away from a dog which barks, it’s dangerous!” the child will behave accordingly and will repeat this behavior in the future. So, the blue manager filters our memories rapidly and it gives feedback to the red manager. However, if the blue manager is in agreement with the red one the processes will proceed.
Amygdala, adrenaline and Fight or Flight Response
The amygdala is an almond-shaped structure in the brain which has the role to handle emotions. When the amygdala perceives a danger or a stress stimulus it releases stress hormones. One important hormone is called adrenaline which is responsible to get your body ready for the fight-or-flight response. What does it mean to be ready to fight or to flee? Well, when people are in a possibly harmful situation our body adapts its functions automatically for survival purposes: heart starts to beat faster, your muscles tense, you lean forward, your breathing gets faster, and your palms start to sweat. Also, we unconsciously respond to different fear stimuli by either defending ourselves or running away.
Conclusion
When someone claps in your face don’t be ashamed if you are stimulated by defense responses like blinking. It’s nothing wrong to try to protect your eyes as loud noises can often mean danger and our eyes need protecting more than most parts of our bodies. So, after the blue manager analyses the situation, the red manager will cease all the fear related proceedings, because we realize that it’s no threat.
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