Synonyms
Definition
Species-specific physiological reactions have evolved in response to evolutionarily stable opportunities and challenges. Many of these responses are conserved across species and can be studied in humans as sets of interrelated, and coordinated, physiological reactions to stimuli with intrinsic and/or learned values.
Introduction
The survival of a species relies on multiple motivational factors: appetitive, defensive, and reproductive. In mammals, each of these factors are characterized by specific patterns of physiological reactions designed to cope with challenges and opportunities in the environment. Research has described physiological profiles of a variety of motivational states, ranging from basic avoidance of predators and defense against threatening conspecifics (Blanchard and Blanchard 1990) to complex social states, such as deception (de Waal 1992) and empathy (Zaki 2014). Avoiding threats and, at the...
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Olsson, A., Undeger, I. (2017). Evolved Physiological Reactions. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_2993-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_2993-1
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