• Question: why do we feel fear?

    Asked by hannahandkatiexxx to Gioia, Iain, Jo, Leo, Mariam on 22 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Iain Moal

      Iain Moal answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      Hello Hannah&Katie,
      We feel fear because of evolution. Not only that, but the amount of fear that we feel is also because of evolution.

      You can think of it in terms of lions and tress with fruit on them. Imagine a population of hunter-gatheres in the African Savannah, eating from a row of trees when a lion approaches. Some of the hunter gatherers are wimps and run away from the lion as soon as they see it because they are scared. Others will stay and eat for a while as the lion gets closer, but then leave out of fear. The last lot are fearless, and stay eating fruit until the last minute.

      Now, I’m sure you can imagine that its no good being a wimp, because then you won’t get to eat enough food, and you are more likely to die of starvation. Its also no good being foolhardy, because then you are more likely to get eaten by a lion. It is best to have some fear, but not too much. The people who are like this are just right, survive more, and have more children than the wimps and the foolhardy people. They then pass their moderate amount of fear onto their children.

      This is just one example, but I could give many others. The reason we have fear is because in our past, those who had no fear didn’t survive and neither did those who had too much fear.

      So, we can tell that we evolved somewhere where there were spiders and snakes, because lots of people are scared of them, especially children. It is also clear that we didn’t evolve alongside busy roads, because young kids are oblivious to the dangers, and we have to be extra sure that the doors are closed if there is a toddler around, to stop them from wandering out and fearlessly walking into the middle of the street.

    • Photo: Joanna Watson

      Joanna Watson answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      Fear is really important because it stops us doing things that would hurt us – that’s why we’re afraid to touch hot things or fall from really high places. Sometimes we fear things that won’t hurt us, but there’s usually a good reason – like it would have been dangerous to our caveman/cavewoman ancestors, but isn’t now.

    • Photo: Leo Garcia

      Leo Garcia answered on 19 Jun 2010:

      We have evolved the ability to feel fear to ensure that we don’t unnecessarily put ourselves in potentially fatal danger! That’s why, in general, people get scared by risking their lives unnecessarily – because those people who didn’t avoid those kinds of situations didn’t survive to pass on their genes to NOT feel fear!

    • Photo: Mariam Orme

      Mariam Orme answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      Fear is an important evolutionary survival mechanism.
      Imagine that you’re one of your ancestors, hunting on the african plains. When you see a lion coming towards you, you have to do something about it, otherwise the lion will probably eat you! Fear evolved to make sure we do something in that kind of situation… when you feel fear, various chemicals are released in your body that affect your brain, and get you ready to fight or to run away: this is called the “fight-or-flight” response.
      Of course these days, this fight-or-flight response isn’t so much use… I tend to get scared of things like giving presentations to big crowds of people, and in that situation fighting or running away won’t do me much good!

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