3 - Perspectives on Fear
The authors wish to focus on the phenomenon of fear in organizations, but will spend a bit of time exploring "some of the many faces of fear" as there is a great deal of vagueness and uncertainty. Fear is often dealt with as an individual emotion rather than a systemic problem - and it has been thoroughly considered but remains poorly understood.
In essence, fear focuses our minds on a very basic question "what will happen next?" and allows our pessimistic nature to answer. It is an emotion so strong that it has pronounced physical effects, in addition to paralyzing the mind, it engages the most primitive impulses (fight/flight/freeze) and disconnects the rational mind.
Fear and the unexpected
The author suggests a scenario: being at ease in a park, when a stranger appears, holding a knife, and running toward you. What do you do?
What you do not do is assess the situation rationally - it takes too long for the rational mind to speculate about the reasons that an individual might be behaving this way. Your survival instinct kicks in and initiates a "fight or flight" reaction to a perceived threat. (EN: In truth, the emotional reaction is less than a third of a second and poises the body for action, but the rational mind generally goes with the initial emotional reaction unless there is time to ruminate.)
In these situation the mind goes into panic mode. All other physical sensations (such as hunger or thirst) are immediately suppressed and attention focuses on the threat. The threat is recognized but not evaluated - you do not pause to consider anything but how to react. The body becomes poised to fight or to flee, and while the knowledge systems are engaged to perform those activities, they are limited to simple and superficial actions.
Testimony of witnesses to sudden events often reflect the limited functioning of the panicked mind: they do not recall exactly what happened, even details such as what side of the path the threatening person emerged from, what he was warning, or how old he was. They cannot justify why they assumed he was going to attack because "it all happened so quickly." They cannot justify their actions, and might recognize them as foolish. Being "scared out of your wits" is a very real thing. Attorneys play on such inconsistencies, often attempting to question the honesty or character of a witness - but it's basic psychology that the rational mind shuts down in such situations.
The function of fear
There's a moment in which the beneficial nature of fear is suggested: it's very primitive, but necessary for survival. Those creatures that react slowly to threats do not generally survive to pass along their genetic material to the next generation, and a species that is devoid of fear is bound for extinction. So while fear gets a lot of bad press, it's entirely necessary to survival.
The problem, of course, is that we no longer live in the primeval forest where we are faced with constant threats. The fear response is still strong, but is evoked in situations in which it is not necessary and sometimes may be entirely inappropriate and counterproductive. Like many dysfunctions, it is a characteristic that is useful in the appropriate degree and situation, harmful when it is exercised to an inappropriate degree in an inappropriate situation.
The physiology of fear
Fear, like any emotion, posies the body and primes the mind for action - but the precise action varies. The author proposes four kinds of action:
- Attend - When we recognize danger that is not clear or imminent, the instinctive reaction is to focus attention and gather more detail, but to refrain from reacting until the threat is clearer and more imminent
- Flight - When danger is approaching, the first instinct is to evade it
- Fight - When escape is impossible, then the instinct is to counterattack
- Freeze - When fighting back is impossible, the instinct is to freeze
(EN: I do not believe this to be accurate, and there's no reference. The four reactions are familiar, but the decision tree seems a bit too convenient and mechanistic. The determination of action is probably less logical and based more on conditions than the author suggests.)
The author describes some of the physiological responses to fear: increased pulse and respiration, constriction of blood vessels, paling of flushing, relaxation of the bladder, a release of adrenaline and cortisol, increased blood glucose, dilation of the pupils, and so on. These are all processed in the amygdale and hypothalamus, before the stimuli can be analyzed by the frontal cortex, and the body is poised for action and prepared to take damage.
It's noted that many people enjoy the physical sensation of fear. It is the reason we enjoy amusement parks and horror films, going to the zoo to see fierce creatures. For most people, small doses of fear in situations that are arranged to prevent an actual threat of danger constitute forms of entertainment. For others, more active pursuits with fewer safety constraints are sought for a higher level of fear stimulation: skiing, skydiving, and the like all create a physical response of fear.
Fear is contagious
Another interesting thing about social creatures is that there are shared emotions. Among pack and herd animals, it can often be seen that the fear response of one creature causes others nearby to have a similar fear reaction: they do not see what the initial creature saw, but have a fear response as if they had. This is the reason that spectator sports and the theatre are effective in creating emotions in audiences who do not experience an event, but witness another person's emotional reaction and have a corresponding feeling.
This response is not sympathetic, but empathetic, and is a species survival mechanism. It can also be harmful, as a panicked crowd can do considerable damage to its own members. On a slightly more sophisticated level, consider the panic contagion in financial markets: a few people know something about a company that makes them think its value will decrease, and dump their shares. Other traders see the selling activity and dump their shares - not because they know the same things as the original traders, but simply because they have witnessed their reaction to something that is unknown.
In a broad sense, a great deal of social behavior comes of mindless imitation. On the cultural level, it is a conscious choice to emulate certain habits and behaviors of others with whom we wish to associate; but in the moment, it is an instinctive reaction to mimic their behaviors.
Distortion and misplacement of fear
Another common observation about fear is that the reaction is not often proportionate to the risk. Again, this is because fear and other emotional reactions occur before the frontal brain is engaged. We shriek just as loudly at the sight of a non-venomous snake as a venomous one, or at a rubber snake or a twig that looks like a snake.
At the extremes, people can become fearful of many things that pose no threat at all. Consider phobias (EN: which are more in the manner of dread than fear) - under certain circumstances, high places are dangerous and should be avoided, but people have a fear of all heights, even when their chances of falling are very remote. These fears can become so crippling that they affect daily functioning.
(EN: To some degree, most psychological dysfunctions involve a misplaced reaction. A rational fear may be associated to an incidental element. A person who was bitten by a tan dog may develop a fear of the color tan instead of a fear of dogs.)
There's a bit of a digression about people who show superhuman powers under the influence of emotions: the elderly woman who lifts a car to rescue an injured child. Many of these are exaggerations or complete fiction - but there are also credible accounts of people performing less dramatic feats. The author suggests that there is some scientific backing for this notion: studies of the human body's physical capacities suggest that many people can only summon about a fraction of the potential strength or speed of their bodies, whereas athletes such as weightlifters and runners can get more performance from their bodies. It seems entirely plausible that, under the influence of fear and the hormonal tide, a normal person may have the ability to access more of their potential strength and speed than they can when the effort is conscious. (EN: There are conflicting theories here. Some theories that suggest that fear of being injured prevents us from applying our full strength or going at full speed, whereas this theory implies this concern is cognitive and the emotion of fear overcomes it. Both seem plausible, but are contradictory. So it's likely more investigation is necessary to sort out the relationship between fear and physical performance.)
Fear as an advantage
Ideally, we should be able to leverage fear - to take from it the physical and mental enhancements and channel them into rational rather than irrational actions.
Practice and conditioning are an attempt to do so. Athletes train in basic activities, performing them over and over, to develop a habit that can be exercised without thinking. Emergency practice, such as a fire drill, is an attempt to train people in a given course of action so that it becomes automatic - when fear takes over, they are able to do the right thing without thinking.
It is suggested that certain low levels of fear helps people to remain focused and alert, but when this occurs over a long period of time or when fear rises beyond a certain level, performance suffers. However, the author concedes that evidence for this conclusion is inconsistent and largely anecdotal.
Fear in the workplace - and elsewhere
In general, fear is believed to have negative effects - but it is inevitable. In business, and in any human undertaking, there are always risks, and we must find some way to do what must be done in spite of any fear we may feel. But at the same time, to ignore fear entirely is often foolish and dangerous.
So the answer is not to suppress fear entirely, as that is no better than succumbing to it altogether. But instead, we must take an intelligent approach to fear: to recognize whether it is friend or foe and to leverage it, just as we do with any emotional response.