Why Do People Experience Fear and Anxiety?

Why Do Humans Experience Fear? The reason why we are scared or afraid, of things in the world is because it can either be a physical, mental, or emotional response to something that is perceived as a threat. In the case of humans, their response to danger is not always to get away from danger as in the case of animals, birds, insects, and other small creatures, but rather to avoid, or run away from, it. This means that fear is a response that they are biologically designed with and has survival functions to help them survive in the long term, whereas other types of animals have evolved with much less effective fear responses, so that they are not able to survive in the long term without the use of fear of the type that has been described.

Why do some people have more intense than others fear responses? Is it because they are in certain circumstances that cause this much more intense fear response? Some people are born afraid, or more likely to be afraid than other people are, for example if they were born in an environment that was violent or abusive, then they would tend to have more of an intense fear response. Similarly people that go through extreme stress at a particular point in their life may also have a fear response that is much more intense than the average person.

Why do some people overcome these fears and others do not? Well this again is largely a function of the individual, and their genetic makeup. If for example we take the case of an African Grey monkey, which is a species very similar to humans but which does not have the fear response towards humans that we normally have when in danger, these monkeys will climb trees and fly high into the air, and will often do so for no apparent reason. Is it because these Monkeys have learned a fear response? And this is why they can do these things and yet do not have a problem when put back in their normal environments, and why humans can sometimes experience fear responses even when there is no real danger.