Category Archives: parasympathetic nervous system
When Animal Defenses Encounter a Human Predator: Part II
Let’s take a closer look at tonic immobility. When does it happen? How does it affect the animal? How does it affect the predator? And, perhaps most importantly for our purposes, “Does tonic immobility have after-effects?” As we will see, … Continue reading
Disentangling Animal Defenses From Dissociation: Part IV
Today, we focus on the ‘last chance’ animal defenses — those that spontaneously activate when an animal (which includes us!) is threatened with imminent death. So far, we have examined two ‘last chance’ defenses: (1) the evolution-prepared switch to accelerated … Continue reading
Disentangling Animal Defenses From Dissociation: Part III
My unvarnished opinion is that the dissociation literature’s discussions of animal defenses (1) routinely conflate different kinds of immobility (freezing) and (2) fail to appreciate crucial differences between trauma and biological survival. I have been reviewing that literature lately. The … Continue reading
Understanding Dissociation 