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Writer on the topics of psychology, neuroscience, resilience, PTG and well-being
Fable
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- January 28, 2010
- 12:54 PM
- 357 views
Mirror The Body, Mirror The Emotion
by Cole Bitting in Fable
In their study, Evidence for mirror systems in emotions,1 Bastiaansen et al., examine the relationship between mirror systems and embodied simulation.
This examination highlights and advances the connections between body changes, emotions and the simulation of body changes and emotions. These systems also play a significant role in the creation of consciousness.2 The neuroscientific sense of body-mind connection provides great insight into the development of resilience and cultivation of well-being - the two main topics for this blog.
Emotion is the basis for the neuroscientific scene of body-mind connection. An emotion is a physical event in the body. See a large object hurdling rapidly at your head, and your body changes - heart beat accelerates, muscles tense, blood flow accelerates to the legs, time sensation dilates, and the head and face react - head draws back, eyes widen, mouth opens, lips grimace, eyebrows push up in the middle. You fear.
When another body act out an emotion, what happens to our body?
From Bastiaansen et al.:
Observing the actions and tactile sensations of others activates premotor, posterior parietal and somatosensory regions in the brain [systems for sensing and moving the body] of the observer which are also active when performing similar movements and feeling similar sensations.
In other words, what we see in the body of others, occurs similarly in the neural maps of our own body. It is as if the physical experience we observe is happening to us.
One noteworthy exception: The simulation does not engage the earliest stage of somatosensory procession. This stage is reserved for our own body emotions. We duck when the hurling object flies at our head, but do not duck (although we might wince in sympathy) when the hurling object flies at someone else’s head. From the study:
From Bastiaansen et al.:
Seeing the emotions of others also recruits regions involved in experiencing similar emotions... Emotion simulation seems to involve a mosaic of affective, motor and somatosensory components [instead of simply mapping one observed emotion to one specific brain system].
We do not act exactly as others act, and we do not emote exactly as other emote. If an emotion dictates the automatic behavior of others, it triggers a more generalized simulation (and more generalize awareness of the event) in us. Our response is empathic rather than specific. The quality of our empathy related to quality of our own simulation. Similarly, two people observing the emotion of a third person, will have different empathic experience.
From Bastiaansen et al.:
Recent experimental evidence suggests that motor simulation may be a trigger for the simulation of associated feeling states. This mosaic of simulations may be necessary for generating the compelling insights [my ital.] we have into the feelings of others. Through their integration with, and modulation by, higher cognitive functions, they could be at the core of important social functions, including empathy, mind reading and social learning.
In other words, simulations in our body trigger simulations of feelings. This pathway generates “compelling insights” valuable for our social behavior. We understand others through simulating our own experience of the events and emotions of others.
We are emotional about the emotions of other. Our body changes in a direct relationship to the body-state changes of others. This relationship is evolutionarily advantageous. For example, if after eating, one person starts throwing up, we should all throw up to expel potential poisons from our bodies.
Evolution provides for a) emotion and b) simulated emotions about the emotions of others. These systems developed before the systems needed to create a mental experience of these body events. Emotion, empathy and theory of mind evolved first.
It is highly likely that the development of consciousness is significantly based on the ability to simulate emotions about emotions. If changes to our body-state is the basis for having emotions about emotions, our body-state changes are also the basis of consciousness. How our body experiences an event is a precursor to our mental experience of an event.
Bastiaansen JA, Thioux M, & Keysers C (2009). Evidence for mirror systems in emotions. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 364 (1528), 2391-404 PMID: 19620110
↩
Antonio Damasio provides the most well developed, accessible discussion of the body-mind connection and the creation of consciousness.
Damasio, A. The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness. Harvest Books; 2000. ↩
... Read more »
Bastiaansen JA, Thioux M, & Keysers C. (2009) Evidence for mirror systems in emotions. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 364(1528), 2391-404. PMID: 19620110
- February 2, 2010
- 02:50 PM
- 353 views
Growth From Suffering
by Cole Bitting in Fable
In their article, Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence,1 Tedeschi and Calhoun create a valuable framework for evaluating a routine consequence of trauma - personal growth.
Traumatic events are “profoundly disturbing,” cause significant anxiety and stress, can give rise to “dysfunctional patterns of thinking,” including “repetitive intrusions of thoughts and images,” cause unpleasant, potentially significant physical reactions, and can cause or exacerbate psychiatric disorders. Said bluntly, traumatic events are bad.
Posttraumatic Growth (PTG) is how adaptive personal development arises from the harsh circumstances of traumatic events. PTG is the consequence of “the struggle with in the aftermath of trauma.”
Tedeschi and Calhoun:
In the developing literature of posttraumatic growth, we have been finding reports of growth experiences in the aftermath of traumatic events far outnumber reports of psychiatric disorders... The widespread assumptions that traumas often result in disorder should not be replaced with expectations that growth is an inevitable result. Instead, we are finding that continuing personal distress and growth often coexist...
An approach to a traumatic experience, however old, should focus on both the healing of the distress and the opportunities for development. Many of the self-selected avoidant-responses to emotional distress limit the capacity for PTG. Even more constructive coping strategies might also be too narrow in scope.
Growth is the consequence of suffering and struggle. Perhaps the more intentional the process of struggle, the greater the realization of self development. In this sense, the re-viewing of our collection of traumatic experiences is a necessary foundation for on-going personal development.
The contemporary, pop-psychology, self-help approach to past distress is to use a positive frame, and describe traumatic events as “opportunities,” or “challenges,” and focus on positive outcomes rather than the hardship. This bias limits the sense of suffering and struggling. Ironically, excessive positive thinking might diminish the opportunity for PTG.
Tedeschi and Calhoun:
PTG is not simply a return to baseline - it is an experience of improvement that for some persons is deeply profound...
The psychological processing of the crisis events has a highly emotional element connected to it. What makes these experiences transformative seems to be that they have this affective component, so that the lessons are not merely intellectual reflections...
PTG is most like a consequence of attempts at psychological survival, and it can coexist with the residual distress of the trauma.
Because a traumatic event involves attempts at psychological survival and are highly emotional, these events and their residual distress are likely to have significant body-based qualities. In general, we would expect that the memory of a traumatic event would be “visceral.”
Because of such a significant affective quality, traumatic events are likely to highly “instructive” and “informative.” These experiences are not just “lessons” in a simple cognitive sense, but rather in the experiential sense which alters internal working models, schemas, sense-making beliefs and even autobiography. Working with past traumatic experiences may be central to developing a constructive outlook on life and a durable sense of well being.
Trauma thoughts, such as “I’m unable,” “I’m unworthy,” or “I’m ignorant,” all have a strong aversive visceral feel and sense of vulnerability. Too often, the aversive visceral feel limits the capacity at peace with a sense of vulnerability, It triggers defensive responses such as avoiding or splitting of the pain and also stifles PTG. These defensive responses partly explain the difficulty in reworking aspects of a personal outlook based on trauma thoughts.
Tedeschi and Calhoun:
The identification of strength (to handle the suffering and struggle) is often correlated, almost paradoxically, with an increased sense of being vulnerable.
PTG is, in one significant way, the development of the capacity to sit with an increased sense of being vulnerable. We feel highly vulnerable with the archetypal trauma thoughts: “I’m unable,” “I’m unworthy,” and “I’m ignorant.”
The development of resources to sit with these thoughts, rather than simply push them aside, might be a significant quality to personal growth. The spirit is born of suffering.
I explore the subject of trauma thoughts in more detail in my essay: Peanut Butter: Able, Worthy and Wise.
I intend to write more on the article by Tedeschi and Calhoun.
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004). TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence" Psychological Inquiry, 15 (1), 1-18 DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
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... Read more »
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004) TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence". Psychological Inquiry, 15(1), 1-18. DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
- February 18, 2010
- 11:02 AM
- 334 views
Growth Needs Sadness
by Cole Bitting in Fable
It appears that few people consciously intend to make meaning out of trauma or to benefit from it. Posttraumatic Growth is most likely a consequence of attempts at psychological survival.
Tedeschi and Calhoun, Posttraumatic Growth 1
After a traumatic event, what then? The trauma itself causes significant psychological distress and need for psychological adjustment to alleviate the distress. Without adjustment, the posttraumatic distress persists (and if pathological is PTSD).
Trauma itself is distressing, and its aftermath violates beliefs (our primal assumptions) about the self and the world around. Brewin et al:2
Trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group. These include assumptions (not necessarily conscious ones) about personal invulnerability from death or disease, status in a social hierarchy, the ability to meet internal moral standards and achieve major life goals, the continued availability and reliability of attachment figures, and the existence of an orderly relation between actions and outcomes.
The recovery from trauma involves two major processes - healing pain and struggling with consequences - the alleviation of distress and the accommodation of disruption to our physical circumstances and primal assumptions. In fact, if we fail to heal but make some sense, we can have both posttraumatic distress and posttraumatic growth [PTG]. Tedeschi and Calhoun:
This description of [PTG] is positive, because the experience of growth is viewed this way. However, the presence of growth does not necessarily signal an end to pain or distress, and usually it is not accompanied by a perspective that view the crisis, loss, or trauma itself as desirable. Many persons facing devastating tragedies do experience growth arising from their struggles. The events themselves, however, are not viewed as desirable - only the good that has come out of having to face them.
Also,
The person facing a major life crisis must find ways of managing initial distress, which can often be debilitating. This is necessary to allow some degree of constructive cognitive processing to occur, producing schema changes that will contribute to the experience of PTG... [Cognitive processing] leads to disengagement from previous goals and assumptions, as it becomes clear that the old way of living is no longer appropriate in radically changed circumstances [accommodation]. This often lengthy process during which distress persists may actually be important for the maximum degree of PTG to occur. This distress keeps the cognitive processing active, whereas a rapid resolution is probably an indication that the assumptive world was not severely tested, and could [already] accommodate the traumatic events.
The ability to regulate distress is important to PTG. The sensations of threat (e.g. overwhelming sadness, unmanageable rage, freezing terror or violent disgust) trigger dominance or withdrawal responses. When the sensations move outside a victim's window of tolerance, they cause hyper- or hypo-arousal, and these dysregulated states shut down cognitive processing and engage more primate defenses.
After the failure to regulate distress, a victim will create psychological defenses to limit the risk of additional threats. A traditional defense is to repress the experience and identify with a superficial account of the event. This defense functions as a means to preserve old assumptions in the face of the demand for accommodation.
If instead, psychological distress is somehow simply alleviated such that threats do not trigger arousal, then the struggle with the aftermath might be limited to addressing changes to physical circumstances (e.g. the loss of a house). What if a natural disaster caused the fire, put a family member in the hospital and destroyed a computer holding a life's work? What of the senseless violation of primal beliefs? Without the affect-laden experience, without the suffering, how are those losses accommodated? Therapeutic interventions to alleviate distress can limit greater long-term gains.3
How are losses accommodated? The emotion of loss is sadness, and if sadness persists it becomes a mood state symptomatic of depression. Sadness and depressive symptoms are both natural and likely necessary for the process of accommodation and PTG. Sadness abates as unobtainable goals are abandoned and naive beliefs about the self and the world around are discarded. Tedeschi and Calhoun:
In our conception of PTG, there is the additional complication that people who report growth must disengage, or give up, certain goals and basic assumptions, at the same time persisting in an attempt at building new schemas, goals, and meanings. This persistence in cognitive processing should be associated with PTG.
To give up such goals and beliefs without a new sense of direction and understanding is a form of intolerable self-negation. The constructive response to sadness is an important quality to PTG because it mediates the sense of self during a process of loss and growth. Dolbier et al.:4
Depressive symptoms negatively related to growth, yet became a positive predictor after controlling for hopeful coping, self-leadership and self-esteem [qualities positively correlated with PTG]. Mediation tests suggested that depressive symptoms exert an indirect negative influence through the mediators of self-leadership and self-esteem; that is, those who have high depressive symptoms may also have lower levels of these personal characteristics, which in turn lead to less growth. Simultaneously, however, depressive symptoms exert a direct positive effect on growth; that is, when self-leadership and self-esteem are controlled, depressive symptoms may serve as a “wake up call” to the individual. These results suggest that growth occurs when individuals have a sufficient foundation of self-leadership and self-esteem present, yet sufficient distress to merit an examination of current beliefs and feelings in the context of past trauma and adaptations. As such, depressive feelings serve as a catalyst to disrupt and then help reshape basic beliefs about oneself and the world (Carver, 1998).
In defense to trauma, we often we deny our helplessness or immediately effort plans to replace the loss. Sadness can short-circuit our defenses. It suppresses our reactivity and arousal, it limits the compulsion to take foolhardy action to replace loss, it reduces our ability to limit rumination or become distracted by other activities, and finally, it facilitates the realization and acceptance of loss.
An event is traumatic in part because we cannot effectively regulate our own sadness. We were helpless and did suffer loss: we were the victim. If we cannot tolerate our sadness, we might make it part of the superficial account and our identity: "It's sad what happened, but I'm OK. I'm cursed, but I've gotten used to it." If instead, we engage more constructive responses, the ones appropriate to the sadness, we seek to be sad for our loss rather than sad for our selves. In this way, we work to tolerate a piece of the intolerable: On the one hand, we struggle to accommodate, and on the other, we suffer our own self-pity. In sadness our accommodation grows and our self-pity diminishes. Sadness mediates the change in self-concept and provides the backdrop for PTG.
Other related articles on PTG:
Posttraumatic Growth from Awe?
Growth from Suffering
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004). TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence" Psychological Inquiry, 15 (1), 1-18 DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
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Brewin CR, Dalgleish T, Joseph S. A dual representation theory of posttraumatic stress disorder. Psychological Review. 1996;103(4):670-686. ... Read more »
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004) TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence". Psychological Inquiry, 15(1), 1-18. DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
Dolbier, C., Jaggars, S., & Steinhardt, M. (2009) Stress-related growth: pre-intervention correlates and change following a resilience intervention. Stress and Health. DOI: 10.1002/smi.1275
- March 15, 2010
- 10:16 AM
- 325 views
How Loss Creates Depression And Growth
by Cole Bitting in Fable
The Creative Destruction of Loss: Can We Grow More Than We Wither?
Height is a trait: the taller the man, the greater the (evolutionary) fitness, at least to a certain point. The average height of a population closely approximates the optimal height. There is a distribution around this optimal norm: some are taller and some are shorter. Neuroticism,1 like height, is also a trait.
Language is an adaptation - an innate capacity baked into our DNA. Language skill is a trait, influenced by genetics but not uniform across the gene pool. Depressive behavior, like language, is an adaptation, and neuroticism is the equivalent to language skill or height.
The setting for depressive behavior is a low mood state.
Daniel Nettle:2
Low mood describes a temporary emotional and physiological state in humans, typically characterised by fatigue, loss of motivation and interest, anhedonia (loss of pleasure in previously pleasurable activities), pessimism about future actions, locomotor retardation, and other symptoms such as crying...3
Since the generic trigger of low mood is loss of or lack of access to some important resource, low mood may usefully be seen as an evolved suite of responses to unfavourable or adverse situations... Note that this does not mean that clinical depression itself represents adaptive behaviour... Low mood probably has multiple adaptive functions in unpropitious circumstances, subserved by its various different symptoms. [Italics mine]
Loss is one of the principal triggers of depressive behavior. In this analytical framework, what is loss? It is the loss of the abilities and resources necessary to live an optimal life. It is the loss of life fitness. The more we have lost, the greater our peril (we are more likely to die and less likely to have children). The loss of social status, for example, is a significant loss because it can imperil access to resources (e.g. food) and the ability to attract a suitable mate.
When we experience expected or readily manageable loss (of fitness), it is appropriate for our mood state to reflect the increased peril. With fewer resources, we have a more limited ability to risk fitness for possible reward. We must be cautious and the low mood state appropriately evokes congruent behaviors.
Daniel Nettle, again:
When the individual’s state is poor, a risky venture going wrong could push state down further into the danger area, and so behaviours with a small variance in payoff are preferred. When state is better, the individual can absorb potential failures and so is in a position to try out risky options that might just lead to a big payoff. Thus, to a very considerable extent, the model [for behavior responses to peril] supports existing views for the adaptive functions of low mood symptoms, and of positive emotions in general: when things are going quite badly, it is not the time to take risks, but as things improve, greater experimentation is warranted. [Economics would indicate such behavior is highly rational.]
One category of loss/limitation is the readily manageable, usually expected loss. During winter, for example, we lose access to new food. Because winter is expected, our contextual understanding accommodates our sensation-based experience. These sets of memories (contextual and sensation-based) are aligned and integrated. The event of loss - winter - matches our anticipation of loss. The level of distress is appropriate to the loss, and the salience of both is minimized because of the strength of the context. Put simply, the actual experience was as it was supposed to be.
Chris Brewin:4
According to dual representation theory, perception of a moderately stressful or emotionally salient event results in the creation of more enduring contextual memories [C-reps] and sensory-based memories [S-reps]...
In healthy individuals, the S-rep [sensation-based memory] for an extreme event is associated to a corresponding C-rep [contextual memory]. The association to the corresponding C-rep has two consequences: (a) allowing the event to be correctly integrated with its semantic and autobiographical context... and (b) allowing for increased top-down control.
What is context? Context is a set of beliefs, unchallenged assumptions, values, scripts, schemas, internal working models, biases, etc. Context is nothing less than the model of the world and how we most effectively and efficiently respond to it. We architect memories from a limited, biased sampling of new information and from the narrative and structural elements of already accepted ‘context.’
When the contextual and sensation-based memories of a loss have a strong correspondence (i.e. they are congruent), the consequent depressive behavior occurs without associated dissonance and the related neuroticism. However, if the winter were more severe than usual, we would not build contextual memories as efficiently. The surplus of sensation-base memories would cause dissonance - the sensation that something was not as it was supposed to be. Literally, we would have experience we could not account for: too much experience, too little understanding, an unnerving combination.
Neuroticism is our sensitivity to dissonance and the associated low mood state. If the winter was unexplainably severe, we would become neurotic - more focused on identifying behaviors to limit the loss of fitness, on developing improved understanding of the reasons for the severe winter.
Fresh insights allow us to create more viable contextual memories - better explanations - of the distressing loss. We come to associate the contextual memories with the sensory-based memories alleviating the distress and dissonance. In other words, as long as we are ill-at-ease, we seek better understanding. Similarly, understanding is relief.
We might conclude, ”The winter was severe because we did not pay tribute to the harvest god.” The accuracy of the belief is not relevant, rather the strength of the explanation is.
The losses which are associated with the greatest mental anguish are unexpected losses. The losses are inexplicable. They also destroy prior context, causing trauma.
Brewin et al.:5
Trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group. These include assumptions (not necessarily conscious ones) about personal invulnerability from death or disease, status in a social hierarchy, the ability to meet internal moral standards and achieve major life goals, the continued availability and reliability of attachment figures, and the existence of an orderly relation between actions and outcomes.
Trauma’s epistemic wounds are the means of destroying context. In the aftermath of these events, we have a limited array of contextual memories to match the many powerful, affect-laden, overwhelming sensation-based memories. In other words, without context, the sensation-based memories become intrusive imagery. We relive the trauma experiences rather than contextually re-experience them.
Chris Brewin (2010) again:
Normal encoding involves the creation of contextual memories [C-reps] and sensory-based memories [S-reps] with connections between the two. Pathological encoding involves relatively stronger S-reps [sensation-based memories], relatively weaker C-reps [contextual memories], and impaired connections between them.
Trauma causes Brewin’s “pathological encoding.” We failed, we were overwhelmed, we didn’t know what to do. We lost significant life fitness and don’t understand why. As a result, we continue to experience significant, persistent dissonance. We relive the associated images repeatedly and intrusively.
Given the heightened peril cause by the loss of life fitness, our mood drops and our behaviors change. We become neurotic. In other words, we are distressed by the loss, and we experience our depressive behaviors as the mental experienc... Read more »
NETTLE, D. (2004) Evolutionary origins of depression: a review and reformulation. Journal of Affective Disorders, 81(2), 91-102. DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2003.08.009
Brewin, C., Gregory, J., Lipton, M., & Burgess, N. (2010) Intrusive images in psychological disorders: Characteristics, neural mechanisms, and treatment implications. Psychological Review, 117(1), 210-232. DOI: 10.1037/a0018113
Brewin, C., Dalgleish, T., & Joseph, S. (1996) A dual representation theory of posttraumatic stress disorder. Psychological Review, 103(4), 670-686. DOI: 10.1037/0033-295X.103.4.670
Nettle, D. (2009) An evolutionary model of low mood states. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 257(1), 100-103. DOI: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2008.10.033
Watkins, E. (2008) Constructive and unconstructive repetitive thought. Psychological Bulletin, 134(2), 163-206. DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.134.2.163
Nettle, D. (2006) The evolution of personality variation in humans and other animals. American Psychologist, 61(6), 622-631. DOI: 10.1037/0003-066X.61.6.622
- February 11, 2010
- 01:01 PM
- 313 views
Posttraumatic Growth from Awe?
by Cole Bitting in Fable
The emotion awe is little studied, but is unique and perhaps exceptionally important because of its ability to induce accommodation - a state which creates flexibility in values and beliefs. Awe, simply put, facilitates personal change and growth. Awe also is an emotion associated with the negation of self, and the regulation of the self in the presence of negation might affect the ability to cope with and heal trauma.
In their article, The nature of awe: Elicitors, appraisals, and effects on self-concept,1 Shiota, Keltner, Mosssman present four studies which create some context for the discussion of awe:
Findings from Study 1 suggest that awe is elicited by information rich stimuli, rather than the opportunity for material reward or social engagement. Study 3 suggested that awe-prone people are particularly comfortable with revising their mental representations of the world. Findings from Study 2 suggest that the experience of awe is associated with a sense of smallness of the self and the presence of something greater than the self, as well as some disengagement from awareness of the self. Studies 3 and 4 suggested that awe does, however, have an impact on the content of the self-concept, increasing one’s sense of the self as part of a greater whole - a self-concept that de-emphasises the individual self. [Italics mine.]
Awe is an information emotion (as are curiosity, wonder, foolish or “feeling idiotic.”) Awe has tremendous arousal, can have both positive or negative valence (terror or horror are ‘flavors’ of awe), and has negative dominance (awe is a strong ‘withdraw’ emotion).2
Keltner and Haidt define prototypical awe:3
We propose that two features form the heart of prototypical awe: vastness and accommodation. Vastness refers to anything that is experienced as being much larger than the self... Vastness is often a matter of simple physical size, but it can also involve social size such as fame, authority or prestige...
We propose that prototypical awe involves a challenge to or negation of mental structures when they fail to make sense of an experience of something vast. Such experiences can be disorienting and even frightening... since they make the self feel small, powerless and confused They also often involve feelings of enlightenment and even rebirth, when mental structures expand to accommodate truths never before known. We stress that awe involves a need for accommodation, which may or may not be satisfied. The success of one’s attempts at accommodation may partially explain why awe can be both terrifying (when one fails to understand) and enlightening (when one succeeds).
A traumatic event overwhelms the self-concept and threatens “annihilation.” It compels the ‘withdrawl’ of the self (and perhaps engenders a more clinical sense of dissociation). One way to characterize trauma is as a violation of basic assumptions, in a sense, an “information wound.” Brewin et al:4
Trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group. These include assumptions (not necessarily conscious ones) about personal invulnerability from death or disease, status in a social hierarchy, the ability to meet internal moral standards and achieve major life goals, the continued availability and reliability of attachment figures, and the existence of an orderly relation between actions and outcomes.
When events destroy these primal assumptions, do we accommodate the change? Or preserve the assumptions?
One of the traditional defenses to trauma is to preserve assumptions. This defense creates a superficial account of the event and repress its affect-laden experience which would otherwise require accommodation (for more of my own writing, see Faerie Tales and Night Mares and Splitting and Healing Emotional Distress).
This type of defense suggests the inability to regulate the sense of self in face of a self-negating experience. On the one hand, a rigid self-concept is maintained, and on the other, the terror of negation is repressed. If self-experience could be maintained in the face of the terror of negation, then the need for this split would diminish, the superficial account and the affect-laden experience would be integrated, and the trauma wound could be resolved.
Awe is at the heart of both the defense and also its resolution. If we cannot withstand the self-negation of awe, we split and defend. If we yearn to change our self-concept, awe requires accommodation and perhaps also provides “additional components of meaning.”
Keltner and Haidt:
Stimuli that are vast and that require accommodation will elicit the primordial awe response. To the extent that these new stimuli bring in additional components of meaning,.. the primordial awe experience will acquire new new flavours, and a new phenomenology. Thus supernatural ideation added to primordial awe yields the religious conversion and submission of Arjuna and St. Paul. The removal of threat and the addition of beauty yields the transcendent feelings described by naturalists [e.g. Emerson]
Central to successful resolution of trauma, then, it the capacity to maintain our self-concept as we re-live the affect-laden experience and integrate it with the basic account of the traumatic event. If this capacity did not exist before the event, then its development, the sense of post-traumatic growth (PTG), is the consequence of the struggle and suffering caused by the traumatic experience.
How do we discover, acknowledge and accommodate these qualities of PTG? Awe, of course:
Keltner and Haidt:
Given the stability of personality and values (e.g. John & Srivastava, 1999), awe-inducing events may be one of the fast and most powerful methods of personal change and growth. The potential power of awe, combined with the mystery of its mechanisms, may itself be a source of awe, giving pleasure both to those who study it and to those who cultivate it in their lives.
For more discussion on PTG, see Growth from Suffering.
Shiota, M., Keltner, D., & Mossman, A. (2007). The nature of awe: Elicitors, appraisals, and effects on self-concept Cognition & Emotion, 21 (5), 944-963 DOI: 10.1080/02699930600923668
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Shiota et al describe awe as “an epistemological positive emotion.” If awe is only positive valence then its negative valence counterpart would be terror/horror. Also, I am inclined to think of awe/horror as “ontological emotions,” not just “epistemological emotions,” because they are emotions of self-negation. ↩
Keltner, D., & Haidt, J. (2003). Approaching awe, a moral, spiritual, and ... Read more »
Shiota, M., Keltner, D., & Mossman, A. (2007) The nature of awe: Elicitors, appraisals, and effects on self-concept. Cognition , 21(5), 944-963. DOI: 10.1080/02699930600923668
Keltner, D., & Haidt, J. (2003) Approaching awe, a moral, spiritual, and aesthetic emotion. Cognition , 17(2), 297-314. DOI: 10.1080/02699930302297
- February 25, 2010
- 12:50 PM
- 269 views
It's What You Learn, Not What You Think
by Cole Bitting in Fable
Some symptoms of OCD might be describable as pathological doubt, for instance, that one’s hands are clean or that the doors are locked. A review of OCD treatments states, “pathological doubt is one of the central manifestations of this illness. The person goes to the door, shuts it, locks it, feels that it is locked, knows that it is locked, turns around, and walks away. All of a sudden, he or she feels that it is absolutely necessary to go back and check. It appears clinically that the memory of the action of locking the door is insufficient.” In this respect, patience with OCD might be seen as the mirror image of confabulating patients who are unable to doubt. The person with OCD seems to be trying to raise her epistemic standards, her standards of certainty, to absurdly high levels.
- William Hirstein
- [Brain Fiction][B]1 pp 97-8
I have chosen not to use the word “epistemological” or its derivatives in my writing, but I frequently describe trauma as violations of core beliefs.2
epistemology |iˌpistəˈmäləjē|
noun Philosophy
the theory of knowledge, esp. with regard to its methods, validity, and scope. Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion. [My bold.]
In other words, a central features of trauma is its epistemological wound. To heal the wound is to create new “justified beliefs,” ones which withstand doubt. These types of beliefs are implicit - somatic markers, dispositions, scripts, biases, schemas - rather than explicit, cognitive conceits. The emergence of new “justified beliefs” will change the contents of thought and the responses to distress, perhaps significantly.
How do we create new learning which we accept rather than doubt? Our body generates such learning from exposure to new experience. In the case of recovering from trauma, our body must a) experience repetitive exposure to the associated distress with b) alternative as-if behaviors. This search process identifies then practices responses which will improve outcome.
Additionally, the reasons for the distress per se, are not significant, rather the nature of the distress is. Central to trauma is three categorical epistemological wounds:
I am unable, a wound to our sense of agency. We doubt our ability to achieve and control.
I am unworthy, a wound to our sense of attachment. We doubt our ability to have consistent access to attachment figures.
I am ignorant, a wound to our beliefs. We doubt our understanding of ourself and the world around us.
Simply put, distress exacerbates the sensations of helplessness, worthlessness and cluelessness. Recovery enhances the sensations of competence, worthiness, and understanding.3
Repetitive thinking [RT], such as rumination, is universal. It is biologically fit and provides the opportunity to learn different responses to the distress of these categorical wounds. It is a necessary part of the healing and growth process. It is normal, however awful it might feel. And like all significant mental processes, it can become pathological. In this sense, RT is regulatory, and much more symptomatic of distress than the cause of distress.
One significant quality of posttraumatic growth [PTG] is the development of new “justified beliefs.” If RT is part of this development, then it should align with the markers of PTG. For this post, I am going to focus on the relationship of persistent sadness and RT.
In a recent study,4 Dolbier, Jaggars and Steinhardt discuss the relationship of depressive symptoms to PTG.
Depressive symptoms negatively related to growth, yet became a positive predictor after controlling for hopeful coping, self-leadership and self-esteem. Mediation tests suggested that depressive symptoms exert an indirect negative influence through the mediators of self-leadership and self-esteem; that is, those who have high depressive symptoms may also have lower levels of these personal characteristics, which in turn lead to less growth. Simultaneously, however, depressive symptoms have a direct positive relationship with growth;[ital. mine] that is, when self-leadership and self-esteem are controlled, depressive symptoms may serve as a ‘wake up call’ to the individual. These results suggest that growth occurs when individuals have a sufficient foundation of self-leadership and self-esteem present, yet sufficient distress to merit an examination of current beliefs and feelings in the context of past trauma and adaptations. As such, depressive feelings serve as a catalyst to disrupt and then help reshape basic beliefs about oneself and the world.
Watkins supports the point that RT is associated with recovery from depression:5
RT prospectively predicts reduced levels of depression, whether in (a) currently depressed patients receiving pharmacotherapy, (b) a community sample, and [sic] (c) 1st year law students...
Compared with abstract, evaluative rumination, experiential rumination reduced negative global self-judgments such as “I am worthless”, improved social problem solving, and increased specificity of autobiographical memory recall. These cognitive processes are implicated in the onset and maintenance of depression. These findings suggest that RT focused on the direct experience of moods and feelings reduces patterns of cognitive processing implicated in increased vulnerability for depression relative to RT focused on the causes, meanings, and consequences of moods and feelings. It is important to note that both variants of rumination involved focus on negative content: Both repetitively focused attention on the feelings and symptoms of patients with current depression.
Susan Nolan-Hoeksema, similarly:6
In light of the effectiveness of distraction and behavioral activation interventions for rumination and depression, it seems paradoxical that interventions designed to focus attention on distressing emotions and thoughts, such as experiential or mindfulness therapies, also have positive effects on depression in some studies...
If rumination serves to build a case for hopelessness, mindfulness techniques may reduce ruminations by challenging the validity of this case. Mindfulness strategies teach individuals that their thoughts are not necessarily true and do not control their actions and that they should instead to view their thoughts as outside of or distant from themselves. Thus, these techniques may challenge the validity of the case the ruminations have built for hopelessness and may train individuals not to mechanically accept the felt sense of hopelessness that comes with depression. Mindfulness or experiential interventions are thought to reduce worry and anxiety by reducing avoidance of painful images and negative emotions and by aiding in the processing of these images and emotions. These interventions may have similar effects on rumination, to the extent that it serves similar emotional avoidance functions.
Doblier et al. focus on the value of depressive symptoms. Watkins and Nolan-Hoeksema note the value of RT under the condition of depressive systems. Together they are constructive responses to trauma and the associated distress (with the caveat that these processes can become both maladaptive and pathological).
The persistence of sadness and the associated RT are processes of exposure and of “justified belief” creation. Recovery from distress and PTG would appear to be the transformation of repeated sadness caused by an epistemological wound into new assumptions, biases, schemas etc. designed to replace the loss of understanding. Such recovery would improve the experience of ability, worthiness, and understanding. It is likely that the constructive adaptation to the distress, rather than improved quality of thought, accounts for the recovery.
[B]: Brain Fiction: Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation (Philosophical Psychopathology), Hirstein http://bit.ly/6Rqla1 "Amazon: Brain Fiction by William Hirstein"
Hirstein W. Brain Fiction: Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation (Philosophical Psychopathology). The MIT Press; 2006.
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I traditionally quote Brewin et al to describe trauma as core belief violations:
Trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group. These include assumptions (not necessarily conscious ones) about personal invulnerability from death or disease, status in a social hierarchy, the ability to meet internal moral standards and achieve major life goals, the continued availability and reliability of attachment figures, and the existence of an orderly relation between actions and outcomes.
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If we have moments when we experience significant rewards for usin... Read more »
Dolbier, C., Jaggars, S., & Steinhardt, M. (2009) Stress-related growth: pre-intervention correlates and change following a resilience intervention. Stress and Health. DOI: 10.1002/smi.1275
Watkins, E. (2008) Constructive and unconstructive repetitive thought. Psychological Bulletin, 134(2), 163-206. DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.134.2.163
Nolen-Hoeksema, S., Wisco, B., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2008) Rethinking Rumination. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 3(5), 400-424. DOI: 10.1111/j.1745-6924.2008.00088.x
- April 6, 2010
- 01:45 PM
- 252 views
Growth Needs Context
by Cole Bitting in Fable
What is Context? How Do We Use It?
What Happens When We Lose It?
One of our most essential life skills is the ability to build context - the core assumptions which enable effective choice of behavior. The literatures on posttraumatic growth, many forms of therapy, recovery from depression or significant loss describe new context as a foundational achievement: recovery happens as we create better, more valid assumptions about ourselves and the world around us.
Two other foundational qualities for recovery and growth are the development of new abilities and the development of social relationships and the associated capacity for self-regulation. In many cases, these qualities are present, just neglected. The building of positive context can reveal these capacities. In other words, as we develop wisdom, we discover new capabilities and relationships we couldn’t recognize earlier.
Traumatic events cause the invalidation of highly significant assumptions. Trauma destroys context. After the trauma, we grow with the development of positive context or wither as such development is neglected. Consider these two definitions:
Tedeschi and Calhoun:1
Psychological crisis can be defined in relation to the extent to which the fundamental components of the assumptive world are challenged, including assumptions about the benevolence, predictability, and controllability of the world; one's safety is challenged, and one's identity and future are challenged. The "seismic" set of circumstances severely challenges, contradicts, or may even nullify the way the individual understands why things happen, in terms of proximate causes and reasons, and in terms of more abstract notions involving the general purpose and meaning of the person's existence. Such threats to the assumptive world are accompanied by significant levels of psychological distress.
And,
Brewin et al. (1996):2
Trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group. These include assumptions (not necessarily conscious ones) about personal invulnerability from death or disease, status in a social hierarchy, the ability to meet internal moral standards and achieve major life goals, the continued availability and reliability of attachment figures, and the existence of an orderly relation between actions and outcomes.
Any quality of learning beyond primal instinct and reflex is context - our somatic markers, biases, scripts, schemas, personalized mind-blindness, unchallengeable doubts and certainties, internal working models, values and personality. Context is nothing less than the applicable portion of our model of both the world and also how we most effectively and efficiently respond to it.
Context is positive if it affirms possibility and capacity. Positive context leads to useful behaviors. Positive context promotes attunement to the present state of mind and body. We can have positive context for negative circumstances and scenarios: the assumption we should flee in the presences of certain threats is a positive assumption.
Context is negative if it is absent, inappropriate generalized or abstract, or worse, if it is a negation of possibility or capacity. Context is negative if it emphasized the presumption of accuracy over positivity. Negative context often promotes behaviors which neglect present circumstances.
When we take time to “think,” to “access higher order cognitive functions,” we are accessing our ingrained knowledge base so we can efficiently choose the most effective behavior. As we access context, we develop behaviors with more accuracy and nuance. It would be like taking care with what you say rather than blurting out the first thoughts.
Suffering Loss
When we lose access to food and shelter, or are wounded, our physical living is threatened. We lose life fitness. When we lose context, our decisioning will be too fast (denying access to higher-order functions) or too slow (worsening peril are losing opportunity), and less effective because of lack of core understanding. Here again, we have lost life fitness. When we lose context, we face the horror of psychic annihilation. We are overwhelmed by our own life experience.
(For a greater discussion on the role of life fitness, see How Loss Creates Depression And Growth)
Posttraumatic growth is the consequence of the struggle to rebuild physical resources, regulatory resources (such as friendships or relationships) and context. Of the three, context is likely the most significant.
Tedeschi and Calhoun (2004), again:
Because of the affect involved, and the restructuring of the fundamental components of the assumptive world, growth seems to have a qualitative and quantitative difference in trauma survivors. Their attributions that growth was accomplished because of, and in the aftermath of, the struggle with trauma may be acknowledgments that much cognitive processing and affective engagement went into the changes they report. Research indicates that when persons who have experienced severe trauma have been compared with those who do not report trauma, positive personal changes are reported at a reliably higher level among trauma survivors.
So understanding how we use and lose context should offer some ideas about how to approach the creation of new, more positive and vital context.
The Body And the ‘What Is That?’
Each iota of experience is the product of body change in response to an emotionally salient object: Body-as-it-was, object, body-as-it-is. These body changes are emotions. A simple organism swims along and enters a patch of acidic water. It reacts and swims away. For a patch of food-rich water, it swims in and enjoys the bounty. The condition of the water changes the behavior of the organism.
However hard-wired by evolution, there is a process of assessment (what is that?) and behavior choice (what do I do?). Together, the answers drive the primal first sentence of experience: body-as-it-was, object, body-as-it-is - simple-organism, acidic-water, organism-fleeing. The answers determine the enacted emotion.
Assessment gathers input from our senses. We have one set of memories for such information. We compose the what from the primal question what is that? We simultaneous retrieve context from our prior experience and innate reflexes to prefigure that. We have a contextual memory to hold this evolving concept.
The Dual Memory Model
Chris Brewin et al. (2010):3
Evidence from cognitive psychology and neuroscience implies distinct neural bases to abstract, flexible, contextualized representations (C-reps) and to inflexible, sensory-bound representations (S-reps)... [Our] model is used to explain how the different types of distressing visual intrusions associated with clinical disorders arise, in terms of the need for correct interaction between the neural systems supporting S-reps and C-reps.
When an event occurs (our body encounters and object), we pay attention to the object and ask the primal question - what is that? We notice things and take in the salient information. We experience the remembered presence of this event.
At the instance of the encounter, we create two types of representations: sensory-based representations (s-reps) of the things we notice and contextual-based representations of the assumptions we make. When the object is as we expect, the s-rep and the c-rep correspond and there are few distinctions to notice. It fades from our attention.
For example, I turn to stare at the wall as I write. The wall looks (s-rep) as it is supposed to look (c-rep). I continue to stare, thinking about my writing, not about the wall. Core understanding could give rise to qualities such as mind blindness. We could choose to search for novelty amidst prefigured familiarity, but our choice would not reflect qualities of being startled or curious. In fact, such behavior might simply reflect boredom.
When something is not as it supposed to be, we experience novelty, core understanding, and speculative assumptions. Novelty is an s-rep without associated c-rep. Familiar information within prefigured context (the core understanding) is an s-rep matched to a c-rep. Speculative assumptions are c-reps unsupported by the core understanding. The combination of novelty and speculation creates emotional salience.
An event causes body change. We emote. I use the following diagram as a generalized form of body-as-it-was - ▲1, object - ▼1, body-as-it-is - ▲2: ▲▼▲. (For more information, see the discussion of the primal first sentence footnoted below).4 The presence of ▼1 cause a body change (the difference between ▲2 and ▲1).
Our choice of emotion is based the ... Read more »
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004) TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence". Psychological Inquiry, 15(1), 1-18. DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
Brewin, C., Gregory, J., Lipton, M., & Burgess, N. (2010) Intrusive images in psychological disorders: Characteristics, neural mechanisms, and treatment implications. Psychological Review, 117(1), 210-232. DOI: 10.1037/a0018113
- April 28, 2010
- 02:50 PM
- 245 views
How Confusion and Doubt Drive All Behavior
by Cole Bitting in Fable
Anxiety and False Assurances First
Confusion Second
Relief Third, Hopefully
Large rocks hurtle towards our heads. What happens? We duck. The process, however, is complex.
It involves answering two questions: what is that? and how do I behave? This anthropomorphic perspective is backwards and flawed. It suggests searching (for what, that and how) and then behaving.
The whole process (what, that and how) can be instinctive, like ducking the rock: body-as-it-was, object, body-as-it-is.1 Usually, the process is complex: We encounter conflict (confusion) and unfamiliarity (doubt).
We automatically (and largely unconsciously) inhibit the primed behavior and resolve the confusion and doubt. Resolution disinhibits and unleashes automatic action, much like a baseball player swinging at a pitch. In fact, a baseball player swings well before he is even aware he has swung or has chosen to swing.2
OUTLINING AN ENCOUNTER
The details of an encounter with an emotionally salient object are body-based. The event and its resolution are expressed in the form: body-as-it-was, object, body-as-it-is. An emotion is simply the change in the body evoked by the object.
If the presence of an object exceed some threshold, our brain is triggered and pays attention. It creates a sensory-representation [s-rep] and contextual-representation [c-rep] of the object.
Chris Brewin et al. (2010), describing his dual memory model:3
Evidence from cognitive psychology and neuroscience implies distinct neural bases to abstract, flexible, contextualized representations (C-reps) and to inflexible, sensory-bound representations (S-reps)... [Our] model is used to explain how the different types of distressing visual intrusions associated with clinical disorders arise, in terms of the need for correct interaction between the neural systems supporting S-reps and C-reps.
To account for an s-rep, and a c-rep, I use a red triangle to represent an s-rep and a green triangle to represent a c-rep. Red suggests concern: unforeseen data viewed as a threat. Green suggests comfort: presumption substituted for genuine insight.
Together, these representations form our general understanding of an object. This understanding has three parts: c-rep unsupported by s-rep [green], s-rep unsupported by c-rep [red], and c-rep supported by s-rep [a more neutral color which reflects the relative strength of green and red].
Our general understanding reflects what we comprehend and what we apprehend. We comprehend data supported by context. Our comprehension usually reflects multiple core-understandings.
A core understanding is a familiar emotion which keys an understood behavior in response to the object. Favorable outcomes and positive affect typically arise from core understanding. However positive the outcome, we often first experience conflict among possible behaviors. Such conflict is central feature of our general understanding. Conflict evokes confusion.
What we don’t comprehend, we apprehend. Apprehension reflects two qualities of partial understanding: presumption (context unsupported by data) and observation (data unsupported by context).
Observation evokes anxiety. Presumption evokes assurance. Too much presumption causes denial, for example.
In general, we view unforeseen data as a threat. Because of these bias, our apprehensions evoke more anxiety than assurance. Apprehension evokes doubt. (Here, conflict, presumption, observation and apprehension describe attributes of the overlap of s- and c-reps. Confusion, anxiety, assurance and doubt are the emotions evoked by conflict, observation, presumption and apprehension.)
Our general understanding of an object does not evoke confusion, anxiety, curiosity and doubt. Rather, confusion, anxiety, curiosity and doubt are features of our general understanding.
At the very onset of an encounter, the emotionality can be quiet complex. When confusion and doubt exceed a threshold, our brain inhibits the primed behavior and seeks resolution.
Our brain resolves. Our body behaves. (An emotion is a body change, a behavior. When I use the word ‘behavior’ rather than ‘emotion,’ I intend to indicate a complex sequence of body changes. Colloquially, behaviors are complex, sequenced emotions.)
From general understanding comes behavior. This outcome reflects the combination of our dual memories (sensory and contextual), and our behavior-inhibition and -activation systems (BIS and BAS). A clear analytic framework for these memory systems and behavior systems shows how automatic the process is. It strips away the pathetic fallacy.
If events are things which happen to us, our behavior is driven by our own unique context - the combination of nature and nurture which catalogs possible behaviors. The more nuanced our context for a given event, the more our best-possible-behavior resembles the best-behavior-possible.
Context is essential to the efficiency and effectiveness of our behavior. Trauma causes damage to context. Any event which does not completely endorse the enacted behavior causes trauma - an opportunity for learning. Some trauma is so severe, it stifles the process of learning and rebuilding context.
Context, Trauma and Best-Behavior-Possible
Sensory representations are just that. Contextual representations are the applicable elements of our context. Contextual representations are assumptions. Together, s-reps and c-reps form a moment of remembered presence within our assumptive world. This statement characterizes individual moments of experience rather than some quality of the self.
Context is any quality of understanding: our innate tendencies, instincts and reflexes - our nature - and our somatic markers, biases, scripts, schemas, personalized mind-blindness, unchallengeable doubts and certainties, internal working models, and values - our nurture. Context is nothing less than our model of both the world and also how we most effectively respond to it.
Context is the means to efficiently identify the best-behavior-possible. Trauma is the means to creating best-behaviors-possible.
A defining quality of best-behavior-possible is that the event’s outcome unequivocally endorses the behavior. A lesser behavior, a best-possible-behavior, will give rise to an outcome which denigrates the enacted behavior, perhaps to the point of extinction.
Trauma violates context and impairs efficiency (here, context and efficiency are tautological). Trauma breaks down core understandings, increases apprehension and causes greater doubt. (In the case of heightened sensitivity to presumption, trauma might cause greater assurance - denials, confabulations, etc.)
As Tedeshi and Calhoun note: the "seismic" set of circumstances severely challenges, contradicts, or may even nullify the way the individual understands why things happen.4 As Brewin notes: trauma generally involves a violation of basic assumptions connected with survival as a member of a social group.5
We struggle with the consequences of a traumatic event. We seek to resolve lingering doubt. Most often, we adapt. We assemble a better sequence of emotions to create a closer approximation of best-behavior-possible. The school of hard rocks is the best teacher and is the primary source of nurture.
Tedeschi and Calhoun:6
Posttraumatic growth refers to a change in people that goes beyond an ability to resist and not be damaged by highly stressful circumstances; it involves a movement beyond pretrauma levels of a adaption. Posttraumatic growth, then, has a quality of transformation, or a qualitative change in functioning, unlike the apparently similar concepts of resilience, sense of coherence, optimism, and hardiness.
The struggle with trauma generates much of our learned (rather than innate) efficiency and effectiveness. If posttraumatic growth [PTG] involve “movement beyond pretrauma levels,” then we adapt, understand more clearly (efficiency) and behave more effectively. PTG creates comprehension.
General Understanding And Memory
Our general understanding is the composition of an s- and c-rep. The correspondence these representations gives rise to three distinct qualities. Observation is the experience of an s-rep without a consonant c-rep. Presumption is the experience of a c-rep unsupported by available sensory data. Core understanding is the combination of known information consonant with accurate context.
... Read more »
Brewin, C., Gregory, J., Lipton, M., & Burgess, N. (2010) Intrusive images in psychological disorders: Characteristics, neural mechanisms, and treatment implications. Psychological Review, 117(1), 210-232. DOI: 10.1037/a0018113
Tedeschi, R., & Calhoun, L. (2004) TARGET ARTICLE: "Posttraumatic Growth: Conceptual Foundations and Empirical Evidence". Psychological Inquiry, 15(1), 1-18. DOI: 10.1207/s15327965pli1501_01
Brewin, C., Dalgleish, T., & Joseph, S. (1996) A dual representation theory of posttraumatic stress disorder. Psychological Review, 103(4), 670-686. DOI: 10.1037//0033-295X.103.4.670
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