Blunt impact as deterrent: human approach-avoidance behaviors and other stress responses studied within a paintball gaming context

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth R. Short ◽  
Michael T. Bergen ◽  
Robert M. DeMarco ◽  
Florence B. Chua ◽  
Richard J. Servatius
Keyword(s):  
Stress Responses ◽  
Blunt Impact ◽  
Avoidance Behaviors ◽  
Approach Avoidance

scholarly journals Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Activity and Sympathetic Allostasis During Value-Based Ambivalence

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil M. Dundon ◽  
Allison D. Shapiro ◽  
Viktoriya Babenko ◽  
Gold N. Okafor ◽  
Scott T. Grafton
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Prefrontal Cortex ◽  
Time Scales ◽  
Stress Responses ◽  
Parallel Imaging ◽  
Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex ◽  
Avoidance Task ◽  
Cortical Input ◽  
Approach Avoidance

Anxiety is characterized by low confidence in daily decisions, coupled with high levels of phenomenological stress. Ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) plays an integral role in maladaptive anxious behaviors via decreased sensitivity to threatening vs. non-threatening stimuli (fear generalization). vmPFC is also a key node in approach-avoidance decision making requiring two-dimensional integration of rewards and costs. More recently, vmPFC has been implicated as a key cortical input to the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system. However, little is known about the role of this brain region in mediating rapid stress responses elicited by changes in confidence during decision making. We used an approach-avoidance task to examine the relationship between sympathetically mediated cardiac stress responses, vmPFC activity and choice behavior over long and short time-scales. To do this, we collected concurrent fMRI, EKG and impedance cardiography recordings of sympathetic drive while participants made approach-avoidance decisions about monetary rewards paired with painful electric shock stimuli. We observe first that increased sympathetic drive (shorter pre-ejection period) in states lasting minutes are associated with choices involving reduced decision ambivalence. Thus, on this slow time scale, sympathetic drive serves as a proxy for “mobilization” whereby participants are more likely to show consistent value-action mapping. In parallel, imaging analyses reveal that on shorter time scales (estimated with a trial-to-trial GLM), increased vmPFC activity, particularly during low-ambivalence decisions, is associated with decreased sympathetic state. Our findings support a role of sympathetic drive in resolving decision ambivalence across long time horizons and suggest a potential role of vmPFC in modulating this response on a moment-to-moment basis.

scholarly journals Neural systems underlying approach and avoidance in anxiety disorders

2010 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 517-531 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Anxiety Disorders ◽  
Orbitofrontal Cortex ◽  
Neural Substrates ◽  
Neural Systems ◽  
Approach And Avoidance ◽  
Cognition And Emotion ◽  
Avoidance Behaviors ◽  
Approach Avoidance

Approach-avoidance conflict is an important psychological concept that has been used extensively to better understand cognition and emotion. This review focuses on neural systems involved in approach, avoidance, and conflict decision making, and how these systems overlap with implicated neural substrates of anxiety disorders. In particular, the role of amygdala, insula, ventral striatal, and prefrontal regions are discussed with respect to approach and avoidance behaviors. Three specific hypotheses underlying the dysfunction in anxiety disorders are proposed, including: (i) over-representation of avoidance valuation related to limbic overactivation; (ii) under- or over-representation of approach valuation related to attenuated or exaggerated striatal activation respectively; and (iii) insufficient integration and arbitration of approach and avoidance valuations related to attenuated orbitofrontal cortex activation. These dysfunctions can be examined experimentally using versions of existing decision-making paradigms, but may also require new translational and innovative approaches to probe approach-avoidance conflict and related neural systems in anxiety disorders.

APPROACH-AVOIDANCE BEHAVIORS AS A FUNCTION OF PLEASANTNESS AND AROUSING QUALITY OF SETTINGS AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN STIMULUS SCREENING

1979 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-233 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa Hines ◽  
Albert Mehrabian
Keyword(s):  
Individual Differences ◽  
Standardized Measures ◽  
Written Responses ◽  
Avoidance Behaviors ◽  
Approach Behaviors ◽  
Approach Avoidance ◽  
Increasing Functions ◽  
Increasing Function ◽  
Indoor And Outdoor

Preference, affiliation, and work, three intercorrelated aspects of approach-avoidance to everyday environments, were investigated using slide stimuli. The slides were selected from a sample of 360 portraying a variety of indoor and outdoor settings, each of which had been rated by groups of subjects on pleasantness-unpleasantness and arousing quality. The 72 slides used represented a 3 Pleasantness-Unpleasantness X 3 Arousing Quality X 8 Replications design. Written responses of subjects to the slides were obtained using standardized measures of approach-avoidance: desire to seek, stay in, and explore the setting (preference), desire to interact socially in the setting (affiliation), and desire to work in the setting (work). All three approach behaviors were monotonically increasing functions of setting pleasantness. Desire to work was inversely related to increases in arousing quality of settings. Arousing quality and pleasantness interacted to determine the dependent measures of preference and affiliation. Preference was an increasing function of arousing quality in pleasant situations, an inverted U-shaped function of arousing quality in neutrally pleasant situations, and a Ushaped function of arousing quality in unpleasant situations. Affiliation was affected primarily by arousing quality in unpleasant situations. Here, it was a U-shaped function of arousing quality—a relationship that was more pronounced for the more arousable (nonscreening) subjects. For the preference and work measures, screening and pleasantness also interacted, showing that variations in pleasantness-unpleasantness had a more pronounced effect on the approach behaviors of nonscreeners than of screeners.

scholarly journals A Study of the Impact of Different Flow Velocities and Light Colors at the Entrance of a Fish Collection System on the Upstream Swimming Behavior of Juvenile Grass Carp

Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 322 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiangpeng Mu ◽  
Wanyue Zhen ◽  
Xiang Li ◽  
Ping Cao ◽  
Li Gong ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Flow Velocity ◽  
Physical Model ◽  
Avoidance Behavior ◽  
Grass Carp ◽  
Collection System ◽  
Optimal Flow ◽  
Avoidance Behaviors ◽  
Fish Collection ◽  
Approach Avoidance ◽  
Flow Velocities

When designing a fish collection system for fishpass facilities, considering the approach–avoidance behavior of fish under different flow velocities and light colors, is essential to ensure a good fishpass efficiency. In this study, a generalized physical model for a fish collection system entrance, including the fish collection system channel, the fish luring channel, and the mainstream channel was designed. Grass carp, a representative fish of “four major Chinese carps”, was selected as the research object, and the approach–avoidance behavior of 660 juvenile grass carps (8–12cm), under different flow velocity and light color at a water temperature of 28 ± 1 °C, were investigated. Three general indicators that reflect the fish-luring ability of a fish collection system were proposed, including the optimal flow velocity at the fish collection system entrance, the optimal ratio between the flow velocities at the entrances of the fish luring channel and the fish collection system channel, and the optimal light colors for approach–avoidance behaviors of the fish. Results indicate that (1) there was an optimal flow velocity (approximately 0.3 m/s) at the fish collection system entrance; (2) there existed an optimal ratio (approximately 2.3:1) between the flow velocities at the entrances of the fish luring channel and the fish collection system channel; (3) there were different approach–avoidance behaviors of the fish to various light colors, and the percentages of successful migration of the juvenile grass carps were 0.4%, 0.57%, 0.88%, and 1.43% of that obtained under natural light, when red, white, green, and blue light were used, respectively, at the fish collection system entrance, indicating that the juvenile grass carps would avoid the red light while approaching the blue light. The three proposed general indicators are the keys in the design of a fish collection system entrance, for successful migration of grass carps. The generalized physical model and the experimental devices and methods will provide important references for studying a fish collection system entrance for other fish species.

scholarly journals Measuring approach–avoidance tendencies towards food with touchscreen-based arm movements

2019 ◽  
Vol 84 (7) ◽  
pp. 1789-1800 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Meule ◽  
Anna Richard ◽  
Anja Lender ◽  
Radomir Dinic ◽  
Timo Brockmeyer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Real Life ◽  
Hand Movements ◽  
Palatable Food ◽  
Interindividual Difference ◽  
Approach Bias ◽  
Future Studies ◽  
Avoidance Behaviors ◽  
Approach Avoidance ◽  
Task Features ◽  
Self Reference

Abstract Most tasks for measuring automatic approach–avoidance tendencies do not resemble naturalistic approach–avoidance behaviors. Therefore, we developed a paradigm for the assessment of approach–avoidance tendencies towards palatable food, which is based on arm and hand movements on a touchscreen, thereby mimicking real-life grasping or warding movements. In Study 1 (n = 85), an approach bias towards chocolate-containing foods was found when participants reached towards the stimuli, but not when these stimuli had to be moved on the touchscreen. This approach bias towards food observed in grab movements was replicated in Study 2 (n = 60) and Study 3 (n = 94). Adding task features to disambiguate distance change through either corresponding image zooming (Study 2) or emphasized self-reference (Study 3) did not moderate this effect. Associations between approach bias scores and trait and state chocolate craving were inconsistent across studies. Future studies need to examine whether touchscreen-based approach–avoidance tasks reveal biases towards other stimuli in the appetitive or aversive valence domain and relate to relevant interindividual difference variables.

scholarly journals The bradykinin system in stress and anxiety in humans and mice

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ari Rouhiainen ◽  
Natalia Kulesskaya ◽  
Marie Mennesson ◽  
Zuzanna Misiewicz ◽  
Tessa Sipilä ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Anxiety Disorders ◽  
Stress Responses ◽  
Receptor Gene ◽  
Kinin System ◽  
Mediated Effects ◽  
B1 Receptor ◽  
Brown Adipose ◽  
Approach Avoidance ◽  
Kallikrein Kinin System

AbstractPharmacological research in mice and human genetic analyses suggest that the kallikrein-kinin system (KKS) may regulate anxiety. We examined the role of the KKS in anxiety and stress in both species. In human genetic association analysis, variants in genes for the bradykinin precursor (KNG1) and the bradykinin receptors (BDKRB1 and BDKRB2) were associated with anxiety disorders (p < 0.05). In mice, however, neither acute nor chronic stress affected B1 receptor gene or protein expression, and B1 receptor antagonists had no effect on anxiety tests measuring approach-avoidance conflict. We thus focused on the B2 receptor and found that mice injected with the B2 antagonist WIN 64338 had lowered levels of a physiological anxiety measure, the stress-induced hyperthermia (SIH), vs controls. In the brown adipose tissue, a major thermoregulator, WIN 64338 increased expression of the mitochondrial regulator Pgc1a and the bradykinin precursor gene Kng2 was upregulated after cold stress. Our data suggests that the bradykinin system modulates a variety of stress responses through B2 receptor-mediated effects, but systemic antagonists of the B2 receptor were not anxiolytic in mice. Genetic variants in the bradykinin receptor genes may predispose to anxiety disorders in humans by affecting their function.

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