|
"On
Killing II: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill"
Only
Anxiety is Forbidden
So
far we have observed that confronting interpersonal human
aggression at close range is, perhaps, “the universal human
phobia,” which can result in a greater degree of psychological
trauma than any other possible human experience. But the
greatest trauma may occur afterwards, as a result of the
midbrain’s “hijacking” of the forebrain.
In an extreme fear situation the midbrain reaches up and
takes hold of the forebrain. Afterwards there appears to
be an immediate, neural “shortcut” to the midbrain which
mobilizes the body for survival in response to any “cue”
associated with the traumatic incident. Increased heart
rate, respiration, and perspiration and a host of other
physiological responses will occur for even the slightest
of reasons and sometimes for no discernible reason whatsoever.
This can be thought of as a powerful form of associative
or Pavlovian conditioning in which a host of neutral stimuli
have now become conditioned stimuli which will touch off
a powerful, “one trial learning,” conditioned response in
the autonomic nervous system.
Time can be a valuable survival mechanism. When our ancestors
first heard a lion’s roar they had to think, if even for
a millisecond, “Oh, so THAT is a lion, I’d better run.”
Subsequently the processing of that stimulus (i.e., the
lion’s roar) would bypass the forebrain and essentially
go straight from ears to their feet, saving milliseconds
and enhancing their survival in the process. Indeed, not
just the lion’s roar, but the lion's smell, the nature of
the terrain, that spot in the jungle, and that time of day
might also all be processed. Subsequently, individuals might
not even know what has set them off, but something caused
anxiety, made the hair stand up on the back of their necks,
and caused them to slink away quietly. Soldiers in combat
soon learn (if they are lucky to survive long enough) to
react reflexively to the earliest hint of the sound of incoming
artillery, and even to distinguish between kinds of artillery
and the variety of responses required for survival, all
without ever engaging the forebrain.
But for those of us who do not live on a battlefield, or
hunt in the jungle, and with the exception of minor experiences
like hot stoves, the powerful associations involved in these
“one-trial learning” experiences can be extraordinarily
distressing. I would venture to claim that nothing distresses
healthy human beings more than to think that they are losing
control of their minds. The midbrain’s “hijacking,” “hardwiring,”
or “bypassing” of the forebrain can subsequently result
in erratic, uncontrollable physiological reactivity. Even
under the best of conditions this can sometimes continue
for up to a year after a traumatic situation. When this
occurs victims can become greatly distressed by the sense
that they are losing control of their minds. But the “best
of conditions” seldom occur naturally. Usually the physiological
reactivity that occurs will cause them to dread further
incidents, because they “know what will happen.” Thus their
fear and physiological reactivity become enmeshed in a vicious
cycle, a self-fulfilling prophecy in which anxiety creates
fear and that fear creates more anxiety and so on. Very
quickly the individual begins to manifest a powerful PTSD
response.
In an attempt to assert control, or to avoid this reactivity,
victims will attempt to (as outlined in the DSM-IV): repress
memories; avoid thoughts, places, or activities that remind
them of the incident; hypercontrol their emotions; limit
their expressions of emotion and affection; and cease activities
that once caused them emotional or physical pleasure. This
intense effort to hypercontrol their own minds and to avoid
this fearful physiological reactivity will result in sleep
problems because what they deny in the day will confront
them in their dreams. They will experience hypervigilance
and exaggerated startle reactions. Their emotions, forbidden
to trickle out in a steady flow, will come out in bursts
of rage and anger.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. If, at the very beginning,
we can teach subjects to control their autonomic, physiological
arousal, then they can nip this whole process in the bud,
stopping the vicious cycle of fear and anxiety before it
consumes them. “But,” we say, “it is called an ‘autonomic’
response because it is ‘automatic.’” Yes, but the bridge
between the somatic and autonomic nervous system is breathing,
and an increasing body of research and law enforcement experience
indicates that if we teach the victim to control their breathing
then they can control their physiological arousal. (This
is based on information and feedback gained from training
over 20,000 law enforcement personnel in this technique
over the last three years.) The breathing technique that
is being taught to SWAT teams, police departments, Green
Beret battalions, and other elite forces around the world
(sometimes referred to as “autogenic breathing”) consists
simply of a deep, belly breath: breath in for a four-count,
hold for a four-count, breath out for a four-count, hold
for a four-count, and repeat three times.
It is not original with me, but I have been teaching this
to mental health practitioners, military, law enforcement,
and to my psychology classes for over five years now. In
one case a young student whom I had not seen for several
years came up to me in the supermarket with a tale he was
burning to tell. “I was in a traffic accident,” he said.
“My car flipped over, and I was trapped in the car, with
one leg broken and one lung crushed.”
“What
did you do?” I asked.
"I
began to panic,” he said. “And then I remembered what you
taught us: ‘In, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four;
out, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four’ and I began
to calm down.”
“Then
what?”
“What
else could I do? I turned the radio on and waited for someone
to come get me. And they did. They pried open the car and
pulled me out and said that if I had panicked and tried
to tear myself out I might have killed myself.”
In
one clinical situation a police officer who was suffering
from a heart attack sat in the intensive care unit and demonstrated
to his doctor how he could cut his heart rate in half using
this technique. Around the world this technique is being
embraced by military and law enforcement organizations who
find themselves using it and proving its utility immediately
before and during the most extreme of all possible circumstances.
And it is being used by mental health practitioners after
a stressful circumstance to teach survivors to master their
physiological response and thereby prevent PTSD.
In the aftermath of the March 1998 Jonesboro school shootings,
I taught the technique to the mental health professionals
and clergy who had gathered that first night. The plan was
for me to conduct the initial briefing, establishing the
cognitive foundations for what would follow, including training
and rehearsing the breathing techniques. The survivors would
be broken into small groups and work their way through their
experiences, one by one. During the debriefing everything
but anxiety is permitted. Laughter and tears came out, but
as soon as individuals began to show anxiety, usually manifesting
itself in hyperventilation, then they were made to stop
and breathe. Thus the survivors of this terrible, tragic
event were able to confront the memories and emotions, while
working from the very beginning to "de-link" them from any
kind of physiological response.
The next day the mental health professionals, clergy, and
teachers conducted debriefings with the children, using
the same techniques and the same rules. The results were
very good. You cannot truly measure success in such circumstances,
but there were immediate, positive responses from counselors
and subjects, and a host of anecdotal support for the technique
and its application in this circumstance. In one case, a
mother complained to a counselor that she was so anxious
that she had not been able to sleep for two nights. The
counselor reports that he had her do one cycle of autogenic
breathing--three deep breaths--and her next response, to
her amazement, was simply to yawn. Also, there have been
no suicides associated with the Jonesboro shootings, although
there have been many resulting from the Littleton, Colorado,
school shootings and the Oklahoma City bombing.
|
|
|
|
Read
a different article:
|
|
