As I understand it, fear is essentially a warning system to alert you that you are in danger, and encourage you to take action (the Fight or Flight reflex). That being the case, why is it so common for people to freeze up, faint, or become catatonic, when these responses prevent them from reacting to the threat, and places them in more danger?
Same applies to other animals. Fainting Goats, obviously, rabbits will sometimes suffer fatal heart attacks in response to fear, etc.
In: Biology
I’ve come to learn this through my own mental health struggles. A fear stimuli leading to panic which leads to action to stop whatever is causing the fear – this is what you’d think normally happens. But when the fear stimuli perceived by the brain is evaluated as having no escape, like let’s say an oncoming car or in another case being in a traumatic situation, the body instead goes numb or dissociated or faints as a way to reduce the pain of what it perceives as not just something scary but certain death.
For example, if a lion was to walk into your room rn instead of acting you’d freeze up. It’s just the brain has evaluated that it’s going to go through extreme pain and death so it numbs your senses / makes you faint as a way of coping.
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