affective brain systems — blog

Fear. It’s there, just waiting to get you!

At Halloween in the US, everything we fear gets lumped together with our dead ancestors. A night that once reminded us to recognize that those who have passed before us might still be with us has now become a generalized expression of fear. In our ripe imaginations, peeled grapes become the texture of eyeballs without a head, cold spaghetti might be someone’s dead brain or guts, the sound of rusty hinges makes our skin crawl as we anticipate something dangerous coming for us, and banging doors make us jump out of our skin.

It's amazingly easy to frighten us humans. . . . But the experience of basic fear, the anxious and deeply uncomfortable arousal in our bodies, the intense desire to escape, is something we share with all mammals.

animal family, animal studies, anthrozoology, human-animal relationsAnne BenvenutiOctober 27, 2017fear, affective brain systems, Jaak Panksepp, Halloween, amygdala, whales, White Fang, PTSD, imagining fearComment

Mammals Suck, and That Makes Oxytocin!

This mamma-baby connection is where oxytocin—the trust hormone—flows at peak levels, creating in both animals (the mom and the baby) the feeling of intense warm attachment. It is the way that the desire for warm attachment becomes part of an individual, staying with her for life and creating the desire and willingness that trust between animals might work. It feels really good to be connected in trust, and that's nature's way of making sure it happens. Yes, this is yet another way in which all mammals, ourselves included, are alike.

Unless we're very, very unlucky, we get lots of oxytocin from day one onward.

animal family, animal studies, anthrozoology, human-animal relationsAnne BenvenutiOctober 10, 2017mother-baby connection, oxytocin, attachment, trust, regulating emotions, pacific gray whale, Jaak Panksepp, Baja, San Ignacio lagoon, understanding across species, animal family, animal studies, affective brain systemsComment

Of Lust and Lions

This lion looks to me like he is going somewhere with quite a purposeful stride, like a parent moving to discipline a child, or a manager heading in to sort out trouble at the office. . . or (yes!) a male lion following a female who has flirtatiously summoned him for a bit of private dancing.

I was actually surprised when the ranger, seeing the female first, said, "Oh look. She's flirting! Look for the male." Sure enough, there he was, rising from his drowsy midday nap in the shade of a tree. . .

animal family, animal studies, anthrozoologyAnne BenvenutiOctober 1, 2017lust on the brain, affective brain systems, jaak panksepp, animals and lust, lions, sexual behavior, social bonds, brain circuitry of lust, understanding across speciesComment

Rage! When Someone Gets Angry, the Play is Over

Last week, I wrote about the fact that all young mammals play, and that a typical play session ends after about twenty minutes, when someone gets mad or someone gets hurt. That's what happened when I played with this Siberian silver fox—yes, this one, photographed by my nephew Thom. After a careful approach that the fox received happily, and some moments of very gentle communion between me and her, I'd advanced to teasing and flicking my fingers in the "now you see it, now you don't" way. The mood shifted suddenly, and before I could say sorry, my middle finger knuckle had been sliced to the bone by some very sharp little teeth. This is how it goes.

human-animal relations, animal sanctuary, animal family, anthrozoologyAnne BenvenutiSeptember 24, 2017animal play, animal studies, amygdala, fight or flight, jaak panksepp, affective brain systems, understanding across speciesComment

Playtime! It's Seriously Important

My dog Lexi is a ten year old Jack Russell terrier who had a rough childhood. Lost in an Indiana blizzard at six months of age, she was brought into rescue with double pneumonia. She spent two months in the hospital before going to a "forever home" that had some human problems with alcohol and violence. Back to rescue. She was a nervous little gal when we brought her home, quick to find a hiding place but also gregarious, liking to mix it up or to cuddle, especially with other dogs. But there was one sure way I could engage her, and that was by playing the imaginary game of hunting my fingers as they acted like mice across the bedspread.

animal family, human-animal relations, animal studies, anthrozoologyAnne BenvenutiSeptember 19, 2017animal play, animal rescue, Jaak Panksepp, affective brain systems, understanding across species Comments

We're All Seekers!

More than 58 million people have watched the video of a turtle chasing a purple ball around a hardwood floor (recently posted to the Animal Family group on Facebook). It fascinates us to see a turtle fascinated by a purple ball. But why not a turtle fascinated by a purple ball? All animals enjoy novel stimulation, all of us like to be engaged by the world. In fact, that connection between being alive at all and being interested in things in the world is so very close that we can't distinguish between them.

animal family, animal studies, human-animal relations, anthrozoologyAnne BenvenutiSeptember 11, 2017turtle, animal play, animal studies, animal family, elephant play, sound and rhythm, jaak panksepp, affective brain systems, understanding across species Comments

On Saving a Moth

One morning recently, I noticed a small dark shape fluttering in the pool. I went over to investigate and saw that it was a large gray moth, desperately and barely clinging to life as water saturated her wings. Her energy was exhausted. I lifted her out and she clung the fabric of my dress. I bent my head and very gently blew down the length of her body, drying her with my breath for perhaps fifteen minutes. And then I raised her up in my hands and blew on the underside of her wings, learning in the process that what looked like two was actually four.

animal family, animal rescue, anthrozoology, human-animal relationsAnne BenvenutiAugust 29, 2017understanding across species, animal family, animal rescue, affective brain systems, ecospirituality Comments

The Animal Soul of Life (Beneath the Human Clutter)

“I would say, if you’ve never seen a horse or touched a horse, just touch it. Because if you touch it, then you’ll feel the soul” (Farrah Akbar, age 8). The quotation is from a New York Times article that I read this morning about human-animal relations, Why Close Encounters With Animals Soothe Us, about urban kids in Los Angeles getting horse-fixed.

animal family, animal studies, anthrozoology, ecospirituality, human-animal relationsAnne BenvenutiAugust 13, 2017animal studies, animal family, animal companion, spirit unleashed, ecospirituality, understanding across species, vox anima, affective brain systems, farm sanctuary, kindred spiritsComment

Animals Again: New/Old Work

I continue to think and to write about my favorite topic, human-animal relations. I published four articles over the past year; and I am working on a new book, more news on this soon. I’m excited about it!

Meanwhile, here is the full text and links to my most recent journal article, a commentary on a philosophical article about animal personhood, in the journal Animal Sentience, published by the Humane Society. It’s a great new journal and I hope you’ll have a look at it.

animal family, animal rescue, animal studies, anthrozoology, human-animal relationsAnne BenvenutiSeptember 22, 2016animal personhood, animal sentience, Locke, evolutionary continuity, animal consciousness, legal case for animal personhood, metaphysics, affective brain systemsComment

Looking Backwards, Looking Forwards, Looking at my Feet!

How synchronistic is it that, after posting the very post in which I complained about the limitations imposed upon my mind by watching my feet for three solid weeks while I walked the John Muir Trail last summer, I should fail to watch them one recent winter day and have fallen over backwards, breaking ribs in the process? So I have been derailed by broken ribs, and thus sunk deeply into the quiet season of reflection and rest. My body has been somewhat limited and my mind has been free to roam.

I reflected on the year behind me and the year before me, thinking that my intentions have something to do with what happens in a year of life.

animal studiesAnne BenvenutiJanuary 7, 2011Jaak Panksepp, John Muir Trail, affective brain systems, Richard Dawkins, Neil Shubin, Inner Fish, ecospirituality, neuroscience and spirituality, University of Chicago Press, Antonio Machado, animal family, animal companionComment