| Popis: |
Attempts to explain the evolutionary basis of anxiety as a reasonable reaction or valuable over-reaction to actual physical danger do not do justice to the robustness, intensity and resiliency of anxiety as a ubiquitous dimension of human existence. This essay proposes an alternative explanation based upon a clearer distinction between fear and anxiety. A comprehensive theory about the evolutionary adaptive value of fear and anxiety must address both primal fear reactions and cognitively more complex, socially based experiences of anxiety. This paper is telling a story about the blossoming of fear into anxiety, an almost universal human experience that was no longer simply a reaction to immediate physical danger. Previous stories have focused on basic fear reactions and the adaptive value of a hyper vigilant arousal response to real physical dangers in the environment. This paper focuses on the time period, 30 to 70 thousand years ago, when human consciousness expanded to include significant room for complex social relatedness. Within this context, a socially based anxiety with more complex cognition had significant adaptive value. More specifically, fear morphed into a multifaceted anxiety that was moldable, flexible, interpersonal and capable of shaping cognition. This anxiety contributed to group cohesion, group loyalty and a deep commitment to the group's narrative. Fear as a reaction to actual physical dangers continued to exist. But now, Homo sapiens also experienced this more complex secondary emotion, anxiety, which had additional adaptive value in the survival and expansion of the population. |
