with several of theses topics, there is obviously a link to mone use…
The emotion of anxiety is associated with the anticipation of harm (a negative outcome, aversive stimulation, punishment, frus
Evolutionary aspects of anxiety disorders
John S. Price, D.M.
Danger and harm are avoided by strategic decisions made at all three levels of the triune forebrain: rational (neomammalian), emotional (paleomammalian) and instinctive (reptilian). This applies also to potential harm from conspecifics, which leads to a choice between escalating and de-escalating strategies. Anxiety is a component of de-escalating strategies mediated by the paleomammalian and reptilian forebrains. When the neomammalian (rational) brain fails to deal with the threat of conspecific danger, these more primitive de-escalating strategies may be activated and may present as anxiety disorders. The capacity for concealment of anxiety and other forms of negative affect has also evolved, and excessive concealment may lead to psychopathology by breaking the negative feedback loop of excessive motivation, leading to impaired performance, leading to signals of distress, leading to reduced exhortation to succeed on the part of parents and teachers; this situation is illustrated by a model based on the Yerkes-Dodson law.
To the evolutionarily oriented clinical psychiatrist, the discipline of behavioural ecology is a fertile basic science. Human psychology discusses variation in terms of means, standard deviations, heritabilities, etc., but behavioral ecology deals with mutually incompatible alternative behavioral strategies, the heritable variation being maintained by negative frequency-dependent selection.
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Many species have both a maintenance phenotype, which is adapted to the natal territory, and a dispersal phenotype, which is adapted to occupying new habitats (Geist, 1989). As each phenotype becomes rarer its fitness increases, so both are maintained by negative frequency-dependent selection. During hominid evolution rapid dispersal must have been advantageous, as receding ice-sheets left new land available for occupation. However, human groups tend to be united by a common belief system which differs from the belief system of all the groups they are competing with. In order to facilitate dispersal, it may have been advantageous for an individual to undergo a change of belief system and to convert some of the group to the new belief system, and to take them off to a “promised land” (Price & Stevens, 1999; Stevens & Price, 2000). Thus two dispersal phenotypes may have evolved: one is the schizotype who has the capacity to undergo a change of belief system, and one is the suggestible or dissociative person who has the capacity to be converted from the belief system with which he or she was indoctrinated during childhood and to adopt the new belief system of a prophet or cult leader. The fitness costs of both these dispersal phenotypes would be grievous if dispersal was unsuccessful, but the benefits of successful dispersal might also be very great, leading to an adaptive radiation in a new habitat. In 45 years of psychiatric practice I have seen many patients labelled schizophrenic who in different circumstances might have become effective cult leaders.
Evolutionary theory and cross species comparisons are employed to review responses to traumatic entrapment reactions ( including hostage, domestic abuse and similar situations), their relationship to complex PTSD and to illustrate the relevance of this approach to the study of PTSD. Such victims may display paradoxically positive orientations to their oppressors. Similar responses are observed in many mammalian species, especially primates. Appeasement is the defence most relevant to the survival challenge presented and appears the essence of complex PTSD. Concepts including dominance hierarchies, reverted escape, de-escalation and conditional reconciliation are illustrated. The biological basis of defensive behaviors underlying PTSD is explored with reference to the triune brain. An evolutionary perspective may bridge those of the biological and social sciences.
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Appeasement - a mammalian defence
Cantor (2005) proposed a model of PTSDs (plural) as over-activated mammalian defensive states of ancient evolutionary origin. Psychiatry has neglected the study of mammalian defences, commonly
grossly oversimplifying them as ‘fight or flight’ (Bracha, Ralston, Matsukawa, Williams & Bracha, 2004). There are six major mammalian groups of defensive behaviors, all of which are to be found in exaggerated state in PTSD (Cantor, 2005). A logical sequence for approaching defences recognizes the needs for energy conservation and minimization of risks of injuries. Accordingly, the first defence is avoidance of threats, followed in approximate order of proximity to the threat by attentive immobility (freezing as a prelude to definitive action), withdrawal (not limited to flight), aggressive defence (including fight), appeasement and tonic immobility. The latter is a physiologically different form of freezing to attentive immobility. It is the final defence typically employed when a predator is about to eat its prey. The victim by freezing may yet deter the predator by confusing it, inhibiting its attack reflex and simulating dead and possibly contaminated meat. Traumatic entrapment situations are by definition ones that are beyond the avoidance stage, withdrawal may be desired but is not possible and aggressive defence is not viable because of much lesser status. This leaves appeasement and possibly tonic immobility as potentially more relevant. Our work on tonic immobility remains in progress, but suggests a much lesser contribution, so the present focus continues with appeasement.
Most of these defences are found in the DSM-IV PTSD criteria. Re-experiencing phenomena represent exaggerated recall of threats – the inability to forget (Silove, 1998, Cantor, 2005). Heightened memory would be a prerequisite for learning a more defensive strategy. Avoidance behaviors are clearly defensive even though the DSM grouping confuses true avoidance, withdrawal (flight) and numbing phenomena. Overarousal symptoms may represent hypervigilance phenomena plus aggressive defence
(irritability/anger). Hypervigilance in psychiatry tends to be interpreted in its physiological sense, but in zoological ecology it relates more to heightened scanning for sources of threat.
Appeasement comprises elements of pacification, conciliation and submission. It is primarily a defence
strategy relevant only to conspecifics (one’s own species) and mostly confined to group living (as opposed to territorial) species. It is generally an irrelevant response to predators, in contrast to all the other mammalian defences in which predation threat has figured prominently in their evolution. Appeasement is activated by situations in which subordinate individuals are under close and serious threats from dominants, when withdrawal and aggressive defence would escalate the risks. Appeasement serves a de-escalating function (Price, Sloman, Gardner, Gilbert, & Rhode, 1994, Price, Gardner & Erickson, 2004 and Cantor, 2005). The appeaser relinquishes his chances of winning the contest but decreases the cost of losing.
Appeasement tends to be expressed in metaphor. For instance, sexual gestures of subordinate male monkeys to dominants convey the message, “I am like a weak female”, and the infantile gestures of subordinate adult wolves convey the message, “I am like a weak infant”. It seems likely that human appeasement has come to be expressed with the metaphor of sickness, conveying the message, “I am like a weak sick person” (Price, Gardner & Erickson, 2004). Somatic symptoms of PTSD should be viewed with this in mind.
http://www.johnprice.me.uk/site/default.asp?k=474
We suggest that it may be useful to regard variation in behaviour as representing alternative strategies in one or more strategy sets. These may throw light both on normal variation and on those variations which are regarded as psychopathology. A simple scheme considers four strategies in a “socialisation strategy set”. These are the “coalitional”, “defector”, “homesteader” and “schizotypal” strategies, each one manifesting differently in high and low self-esteem people. The male coalitional strategy described by van der Dennen leads men to band together for hunting and warfare (van der Dennen, 1995); to achieve this they internalise the norms of the group and they live an extroverted existence. Similar to this but without internalisation of norms is the “defector” strategy, recognised clinically as the sociopath and from the genetic point of view as a free-rider. Leading to geographical dispersion is the individualistic or “homesteader” strategy in which there is preference for a single family unit and the life-style is one of introversion. The schizotypal strategy leads to the formation of a cult with an ideology at variance with that of the parent group, and thus to group splitting. Orthogonal to this strategy set is the high/low self-esteem strategy set, which is responsible for the variation in the personality trait of neuroticism. The schizotypal strategy is seen in the context of previous ideas about the adaptive value of the genetic predisposition to psychotic illness. Some implications of the model for research and treatment are discussed.
Evolutionary aspects of anxiety disorders
John S. Price, D.M.
Danger and harm are avoided by strategic decisions made at all three levels of the triune forebrain: rational (neomammalian), emotional (paleomammalian) and instinctive (reptilian). This applies also to potential harm from conspecifics, which leads to a choice between escalating and de-escalating strategies. Anxiety is a component of de-escalating strategies mediated by the paleomammalian and reptilian forebrains. When the neomammalian (rational) brain fails to deal with the threat of conspecific danger, these more primitive de-escalating strategies may be activated and may present as anxiety disorders. The capacity for concealment of anxiety and other forms of negative affect has also evolved, and excessive concealment may lead to psychopathology by breaking the negative feedback loop of excessive motivation, leading to impaired performance, leading to signals of distress, leading to reduced exhortation to succeed on the part of parents and teachers; this situation is illustrated by a model based on the Yerkes-Dodson law.