Ethology and the biological correlates of mood

Abstract

The insights of ethology-the science of animal behavior from a biological and psychological point of view-were incorporated in the 1950s by the British developmental psychiatrist, John Bowlby, into his attachment theory, which argued that a secure affective base in infancy was critical to the normal development of perception, cognition, learning, and emotion, in addition to that of physical parameters. The theory was illustrated by Harlow's pioneering experiments with baby monkeys: those raised with a wire-frame "mother" failed to thrive, compared with the more normal development of those deriving comfort contact from a terry-cloth surrogate. Modern neuroscience techniques have confirmed that the absence of sensory stimulation during periods of maximal synaptic expansion provides the substrate for a subsequent mood disorder. Ethology offers a novel "nature plus nurture" approach to the development of abnormal mood, as well as a target for treatment.

Beliefs in Pain and Suffering:

“…For example, some people appear to behave altruistically in the third-person perspective of a neural observer, while from the first-person perspective of the acting subjects they feel to be guided by a future reward in which they believe. In the end, how people think and talk about their past reflects their actual feelings and emotions (Cyrulnik 2005).…”

“…Moreover, it has been known since Antiquity that pain and suffering may also be caused by cruel behaviour of people that does not harm physically but in the victims may result in feelings of being assaulted, inferiority, injustice and even of denial of being a human creature. Although virtually everybody has experienced such situations to a greater or lesser degree in one's own life, people learn to cope with such adverse experience because of its mostly transient character (Cyrulnik 2005). But there are instances of ongoing suffering that eventually may turn into psychic diseases characterized by flash-back experiences as found in post-traumatic distress syndrome (Sartory et al 2013).…”

Manifestations, social impact, and decay of conceptual beliefs: A cultural perspective

“…Conceptual beliefs can include personal reports and fairy tales as well as stories about people's past and explanations of their present circumstances. Their meanings in terms of content and emotional loading differ among individuals, because each person has a different history (Cyrulnik, 2005 ). Ancient versions of such narratives often included statements about what to expect in the future.…”

The Interprocessual-Self Theory in Support of Human Neuroscience Studies

“…For humans, the physical treatment that a child receives from her mother explains how she accesses the world. In the absence of a loving triangle between mother-child-the world, the child interprets the world as an insecure place and ends up associating stimulus with aggression (Cyrulnik, 2005). This is so because the mother presents the world to the child: maternal sensitivity modulates the relationship between the environment and the child's genetics, affecting her behavior (Zhang et al, 2014).…”