Antidepressant meds and you...

Remove all ads!

By talking about things. What I mean by this is basic assumptions of behavior and understanding can be radically different, but we can identify those differences by talking about things. As an example, when I first started dating my wife, and I first started observing her interactions with her mother, I thought they genuinely hated each other. I mean, really, deeply hated each other. They were constantly putting each other down and insulting each other, and it wasn't just the mother doing it, but the daughter giving it right back! It took me a few weeks to realize that this was a part of their british humor (the mother is a Brit), and that they were just razzing each other, and that, in fact, it was a demonstration of affection and comfort.

Here's the thing, the human body is pretty well pre-programmed through genetics. The environment, disease, nutrition, etc can radically change the details, but everyone has a heart, a stomach, and so on, and they're generally all in the same place and of the same size unless something's wrong. The human psyche, on the other hand, is almost completely free from genetics. We have so few true instincts that you could count them on one hand. Everything else is learned, and the vast majority of it is learned from interactions with other people. This can go as far down as automatic reactions to stress (the Japanese typically giggle and look away when nervous, for example) to what makes us happy or how we express love.

Think of it like a computer. The bodies are all more or less the same. Sure, the details and quality of the parts may be different, but if it doesn't have a CPU and a mother board and such, it isn't really a computer (as I'm using the term at least). The software, on the other hand, is another issue. Even if both are running the same version of windows with comprable hardware, the existence or absence of spyware protection alone can radically alter how the computer works. What is a critical problem on one could just be normal functioning on another.

 

Of course they didn't...you're not a cancer survivor...

Now *THAT* is the best analogy I've ever heard!

 

Thank you, and the analogy really is very good on many levels. You can also use it to discribe the relationship between the brain and mind fairly acurately, and to distinguish between mental and physiological problems.

To explain it a little more, the "spyware protection software" in a human could manifest as cultural adaptations to stress, ways of relating to elders and/or superiors, how big your "personal space" is, how easily you trust people, biases against just about anything, and much, much more. In the example I gave of my wife and her mother, a casual observation would tell you that this was a severely dysfunctional family, probably with a high risk of violence, and which may well have had some form of abuse at one point or another. Getting to know the "background", the "mental landscape" of the two involved, however, shows that it's actually a healthy and loving relationship, much better than many people have with even good parents.

 

Hogwash! Bah-humbug!

And if you want to discuss this matter (yet another nature vs. nurture debate) then start another thread.

 

I agree - human infants have dozens if not hundreds of true instincts - the whole psychologist vs. biologist thing.

 

Babies have an instinctual fear of falling and loud noises (something most people overcome within a few years), and intinctual grasping reflex, and instinctual suckling reflex, and it seems an instinctual language-learning process (though this whole thing is still kind of confusing). That's it. Even crying for attention isn't instinctual, as some babies don't do it at all, and in some cultures a crying baby is thought to be abnormal. For adults, sexuality is also a complex issue for which the jury's still out, but everything else seems to be learned.

Mind you, genetics, biology, and body form may radically influence that learning (i.e. we learn to walk because we have two legs, etc.), but that's not instinct.

 

NOG, it's not just biology that covers human instincts. There are entire courses in evolutionary psychology devoted to human instincts (google it if you don't believe me). People get doctoral degrees on this topic. It's not nearly as simple as you are portraying it.

And as an aside, babies do not have a fear of falling - they learn that. I saw a study where a 9-month old baby will crawl right over a ledge and fall. (They had a pillow underneath - they didn't let the kid get hurt.) A 12-month old will stop when they get to the edge.

 

I agree with you on this Aldeth but I read that particular example had more to do with a lack of depth perception which may not be developed -- they don't realize it's so far down and just continue as if the edge of the bed and the floor are level.

 

There's a lot of debate on that topic, but they aren't true instincts for the simple reason that not everyone does the same thing. To be truely considered an instinct in psychology, it has to:
a) be automatic
b) be irresistible
c) occur at some point in development
d) be triggered by some event in the environment
e) occur in every member of the species
f) be unmodifiable
g) govern behavior for which the organism needs no training (although the organism may profit from experience and to that degree the behavior is modifiable).
Spiders weave their webs by instinct (though some studies dealing with Orb Weavers suggest even that may not be 100% true). Earth worms tunnel through instinct. Cats learn to pounce and stalk through instinct (seriously, they all learn how, it's just a matter of how much they use it and on who). Humans who don't see others walk don't learn to walk. Humans who don't see others talk don't learn to talk. Different cultures treat anger, love, an envy differently. Basically, if there is any difference in it between different cultures or individuals, it's not an instinct.

Now, that doesn't mean it's 100% learned behavior, either. I go with the analogy that genetics and biology are the gun, environment and choice aim and pull the trigger (i.e. genetics and biology define a range of potentials, environment and choice choose between them).

I didn't say babies have a fear of heights, or of ledges, but of the acual act of falling. This is why the 12-month-old stopped, because he had learned that crawling off the edge would make him fall, which he feared. That's actually a critical distinction.

 

Which is actually not that much different than the point I was making. I just pointed out that you were oversimplying the extent of instincts in humans, which I think you are now agree with me.

I see your point, it's possible to fear falling even if you have never fallen, nor understand what the concept of falling entails.

 

And several other species removed from their usual surroundings start acting in a strange way...