The adaptiveness of fear (and other emotions) considered more broadly: Missed literature on the nature of emotions and its functions

Abstract

We agree with Grossmann that fear often builds cooperative relationships. Yet he neglects much extant literature. Prior researchers have discussed how fear (and other emotions) build cooperative relationships, have questioned whether fear per se evolved to serve this purpose, and have emphasized that human cooperation takes many forms. Grossmann's theory would benefit from a wider consideration of this work.

We agree with Grossmann that experiencing and expressing anxiety/fear can signal support is needed (Clark & Taraban, 1991) and can elicit support (Graham, Huang, Clark, & Helgeson, 2008; Simpson, Rholes, & Nelligan, 1992). Expressing fear also serves a social referencing function by allowing observers to use others' fear expressions to evaluate situations for themselves (Klinnert, Emde, Butterfield, & Campos, 1986; Schachter, 1959).

Yet, we disagree that psychologists, to date, have mostly considered fear and its expression to be dysfunctional and also with the implication readers may draw from Grossman's article that fear is “the” one emotion that promotes cooperative relationships. We also question the idea that infants are evolutionarily prepared at birth to feel and to express fear per se and that caretakers are evolutionarily prepared to respond to fear per se with care. Finally, in analyzing how emotions can underlie human cooperation we think it is important to recognize that human cooperation assumes more than one form and that the form or combination of forms it takes will vary with relationship type (Bugental, 2000; Clark & Mills, 1979, 2012). This means the functionality or dysfunctionality of expressing fear will be dependent upon the type relationship under consideration.

Is the idea that fear builds cooperative relationships novel?

No. Grossmann suggests that psychologists predominantly view heightened experience and expression of fear and anxiety to be dysfunctional. However, large, long-standing, literatures on social referencing and social support show that feeling and expressing fear is often supportive of human cooperation.

Included in this literature are studies by developmentalists showing that very young children interpret their caretakers' and even a familiar experimenters' expressions of fear as signals that they ought not cross a visual cliff (Klinnert et al., 1986; Sorce, Emde, Campos, & Klinnert, 1985). Moreover, both classic (Schachter, 1959) and recent (Scarantino, Hareli, & Hess, 2021) research shows another's fear serves social referencing functions for adults. Extant work also shows expressing fear signals a desire for support (Scarantino et al., 2021), that humans selectively express fear (and other emotions) to potentially trusted-caring others (Clark & Finkel, 2005; Von Culin, Hirsch, & Clark, 2017) and that doing so often elicits support (Graham et al., 2008; Simpson et al., 1992). Simpson et al. (1992), for instance, brought dating couples into a laboratory. The female member was subjected to a fear induction and then the couple was left alone. Results showed that the more anxiety/fear securely attached women displayed, the more they sought support and the more care that securely attached male partners provided. To give another example, in study 1 of a paper published by Graham et al. (2008), participants read vignettes about a person who needed help. In the condition where this person was described as expressing fear/anxiety, participants said they would provide the person with more help. In study 2 of the same paper, when a confederate in a laboratory study looked fearful and verbally expressed fear that confederate received more help than the same confederate who did not behave in these ways. In a fourth and final study, self-reports of willingness to express negative emotions (including fear/anxiety) prior to college arrival predicted forming more relationships, achieving greater intimacy in the closest of those relationships, and receiving more support from roommates across their first semester of college.

Psychologists do not view fear as “mostly” dysfunctional

As just noted, many psychologists recognize adaptive functions of fear. They also know that fear can be dysfunctional when it is disproportionate to the fearful person's needs (Lemay & Dudley, 2011), prevents engagement in normal activities (National Institute of Mental Health, 2022), is expressed to insecure partners (Simpson et al., 1992), or is expressed in non-communal relationships wherein it may invite exploitation. There is no paradox. There simply exist social bounds within which feeling and expressing fear is and is not adaptive and it is also the case that some people do persistently experience clinically debilitating levels of fear.

Have humans evolved to feel and to express fear per se at birth?

Is fear “the” emotion that has evolved to be expressed and to promote human cooperation? We think not. Rather we and many others (e.g., Barrett & Campos, 1987; Stroufe, 1996) believe human infants are prepared to feel and express distress at birth (which is negatively valenced and associated with arousal) when they have a variety of needs. Parents appear to be prepared to respond with care. When this adaptive pairing occurs again and again it builds trust and cooperative bonds (Leerkes, Blankson, & O’Brien, 2009). Later, as social and conceptual learning and language develop, children differentiate distress into more granular conceptual categories such as fear, sadness, anger, embarrassment, and disgust (Hoemann, Xu, & Barrett, 2019; Holodynski & Seeger, 2019). The expression of these negative emotions (and positive emotions too) conveys valuable information about the welfare of the expresser. Their expression, when appropriate to the relational context, supports human cooperation in nuanced ways that have been documented (e.g., Algoe, Fredrickson, & Gable, 2013; Clark, Ouellette, Powell, & Milberg, 1987; Donato, Pagani, Parise, Bertoni, & IaFrate, 2014; Feinberg, Willer, & Keltner, 2011; Gable & Reis, 2010; Semin & Manstead, 1982). There certainly exists broad theoretical disagreement on the nature of emotion among psychologists, but currently insufficient evidence that feeling and expressing heightened fear per se (rather than general distress) is evolutionarily determined and present at birth.

More than one type of cooperative relationship exists

Human cooperation takes many forms (Bugental, 2000; Clark, Earp, & Crockett, 2020). Cooperation in parent/infant relationships, friendships and romantic relationships, business relationships, and in leader–follower relationships differs in form and function (Earp, McLoughlan, Monrad, Clark, & Crockett, 2021). Grossmann appears to write about just one type of cooperative relationship, which aligns with what Clark and Mills (1979, 2012) would call an asymmetrical communal relationship and which Bugental (2000) would call an attachment relationship. In such a relationship a child expresses needs to which caretakers typically respond with non-contingent given care. Yet, cooperation (and caring about treating partners well) takes a very different form in, for example, exchange/transactional relationships. In these relationships, benefits are provided with the expectation of receiving comparable benefits in exchange or in repayment of these provisions (Clark, 1984; Clark & Mills, 1979, 2012). Expressions of emotion are less likely to occur within these relationships (Von Culin et al., 2017). Indeed, doing so can make a person appear especially dependent (Clark & Taraban, 1991), making them vulnerable to exploitation. In exchange relationships partners can be unresponsive to expressions of emotions (Clark et al., 1987). To understand how fear and other emotions and their expression subserve cooperation, we must specify the type of cooperative or non-cooperative relationship about which we are talking.

Summary

Emotions and their expression, fear included, subserve cooperative relationships. Yet to understand how, when, and why this develops (and sometimes goes awry) more attention to and integration with extant work on the nature of emotion, the social function of emotions, and the cooperative (or lack thereof) nature of social relationships is needed.