To Fear or Not to Fear; That is the Question.

I am a musician. Although i don’t study music, I spend one night a week playing in a community brass band. Along with being a musician comes a lot of fear. For example, last week the girl I sit next to (I will call her R) was about to play a solo that she has in one of the pieces. She leaned in to me and said, “Trudy, I’m scared”. I asked her why she should possibly be scared and she said, “I’m scared I won’t be good enough.” She was afraid because that night was the first of a new player in the band.  This new member plays the same instrument and consequently the same music as us but she happens to be studying music at university and is obviously very accomplished on her instrument. Basically R was afraid that she wouldn’t play the solo good enough and the conductor would give the solo to the new and more accomplished player, eventhough R had played the solo well about 20 times.  This situation made me question the purpose of fear. Why is it that we fear things that can’t do us any physical harm? Does fear really do us any good?

Fear is a powerful and primitive human emotion. It alerts us to the presence of danger and was critical in keeping our ancestors alive. But what relevance does it have in today’s advanced society? Does fear still have a legitimate purpose? To answer these questions, we need to break it down and find out what it actually is.

Fear can actually be divided into two stages, biochemical and emotional. The biochemical response is universal, while the emotional response is highly individualized.

Biochemical Reaction

When we confront a perceived danger, our bodies respond in specific ways. Physical reactions to fear include sweating, increased heart rate and high adrenaline levels. This physical response is sometimes known as the fight or flight response, in which the body prepares itself to either enter combat or run away. This biochemical reaction is an  automatic response and is crucial to survival.

The amygdala is a key brain structure involved in the processing of negative emotions (including fear). Researchers have observed increased activity in the amygdala when patients who were shown threatening faces or confronted with frightening situations.  Studies have also shown that increased amygdala activity occurs when subjects exposed to images of frightened faces, or faces of people from another race.

The amygdala is not the only brain area involved in fear as another brain region located in the frontal lobe (rostral anterior cingulate cortex) has been shown to be associated with fear. In a 2006 study at Columbia University, researchers observed that test subjects experienced less activity in the amygdala when they consciously perceived fearful stimuli than when they unconsciously perceived fearful stimuli. In the former case, they discovered the rostral anterior cingulate cortex activates to give the subjects a degree of emotional control. Therefore, fear is not just an uncontrollable bodily response and to truly understand it, we must also consider our emotional response to fear.

Emotional Response

Emotions have a powerful effect on the mind, and fear-considered a strong survival instinct-is particularly potent.

The emotional response to fear is highly personalized. Some people are adrenaline junkies, thriving on extreme sports and other fear-inducing thrill situations. Others have a negative reaction to the feeling of fear, avoiding fear-inducing situations at all costs. Although the physical reaction is the same, fear may be perceived as either positive or negative.

People develop specific fears as a result of learning. This has been studied in psychology as fear conditioning, beginning with John B. Watson’sLittle Albert Experiment in 1920. In this study, an 11-month-old boy was conditioned to fear a white rat in the laboratory. The fear became generalized to include other white, furry objects. In the real world, fear can be acquired by a frightening traumatic accident. For example, if a child falls into a well and struggles to get out, he or she may develop a fear of wells, heights, enclosed spaces, or water.

Although fear is learned, the capacity to fear is part of human insitincts. Many studies have found that certain fears (e.g. animals, heights) are much more common than others (e.g. flowers, clouds). These fears are also easier to induce in the laboratory. This phenomenon is known as preparedness. Because early humans that were quick to fear dangerous situations were more likely to survive and reproduce, preparedness is theorized to be a genetic effect that is the result of natural selection.

It is obvious that fear is essential to our survival. Although we may not like it, it is beneficial for us to have fear. But that is not always the case.

There is another type of fear that was shaped by natural selection and it is what I like to call, social fears. And that is the fear of certain social situations such as rejection, humiliation, judgement, criticism, the fear of not being good enough, the fear of change, fear of the truth and many others.

This is the type of fear that I was having trouble grasping. Social situations that we become afraid of are not direct physical threats to us, so why would we possibly be afraid of them?

The answer to that question can be answered by looking at the purpose of fear to begin with; to keep us away from things that could bring us harm.  We fear social situations because we don’t want to be put in a situation that will bring us emotional distress, and this is where the relevance of fear lies in today’s society. It is the social fear that ensures social acceptance; that we will fit in with other people and keep them happy.

But often this fear can hinder us as individuals. It eats away at us until we are looking to avoid that emotionally harmful situation in every aspect of our lives.  As a result, we avoid large crowds, don’t take risks, don’t ask out a person who we think is attractive, and we push away and deny the truth.  Potentially we avoid things that could give us some joy or lead us in a new life direction.

As the famous saying goes, “The only thing to fear is fear itself.”

Is that true? Living a life in fear will mean that you never come across any situations that could bring you harm or emotional distress. I am confident that a life such as that would make many people happy. But are they as happy as they would be if they confronted their fear?

Perhaps, rather than questioning the purpose of fear, I should be asking whether it’s best to have fear or none at all.  That is the question that fills our lives. Should we avoid those uncomfortable situations and forever be fearful of them, or should we approach those scary situations and be set free from the fear?

To fear or not to fear, that is the question.

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