Mental Health Through the Lens of Evolutionary Neurobiology

Modern human brains are extremely old.  The oldest regions of the human brain, the limbic system and the brainstem, evolved hundreds of millions of years ago.  These brain structures, which govern emotion, attachment, and survival, are shared with mammals and reptiles.  The part of the brain that gives us our more advanced cognitive capacities has been around for about 200 to 300,000 years.

Though human life has changed dramatically since our species first came into existence, we’re still operating with much of the same machinery between our ears.  And yet, if you take a look at the status of mental health in modern society, we don’t seem to be making very good use of this ancient equipment.  You’d think we’d have a bit more mastery of ourselves by now, given how long we’ve been around.  We’ve got ancient biological machinery and we seem to have forgotten how to use it.

If we are to collectively improve our mental health as a species, we need to better educate ourselves on the mechanics of these ancient systems we carry around with us.  If we want to develop better mastery of ourselves, it helps to have a comprehensive understanding of the brain systems involved in the experience of emotion.

There is a growing body of research in the field of affective neuroscience which sheds light on the evolutionary history of human emotion.  The work of neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp is of particular interest.  Panksepp identified seven primary emotional circuits in the mammalian brain.

If we can harness all seven emotional circuits and use them in accordance with their evolutionary purpose, we are more likely to thrive and experience full health and vitality.  On the other hand, if one or more of these emotional circuits is over or under-active, our mental health suffers.

Below I will introduce all seven emotional circuits and describe how each of their overlapping functions influence mental health.  I will explain the consequences of over or under-activity of each circuit.  As you read these descriptions, reflect on your relationship to each of these “primal affects”.  Do some come more easily than others?  Do you find yourself relying on one at the expense of others?  Or are all of these systems of yours fairly well balanced?  Answering these questions can go a long way in illuminating what mental health actually is, and where you fall on that spectrum.

The seven emotional circuits or “primal affects” are:

Seeking, Rage, Fear, Lust, Care, Grief/Separation, Play

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The seeking system:

The seeking system governs motivation and the pursuit of reward.  This gives us the drive to go out and get what we need from our environment.  When our seeking system is well balanced, it gives us a healthy sense of urgency to pursue whatever we need to thrive, both at the basic need level (food, shelter, sex, social connection, sunlight, etc.) and at higher levels of need (knowledge & information, spiritual connection and a sense of purpose, etc).  We know when a need is not met and we have the instinct to do something about it.  There’s a confidence and boldness to a person with a well balanced seeking system.

A balanced seeking system also helps us feel engaged and curious about our environment.  We have a quality of adventurousness, and a genuine desire to explore the world.  We’re willing to take healthy risks in order to learn and grow.

As with all seven of these emotional circuits, problems can arise when the seeking system is under or over-active.

Under-active:  we experience ourselves as unmotivated and disengaged from our lives and from those around us.  We don’t feel a sense of urgency about anything.  Life has a quality of flatness or dullness to it.  We don’t see the value in taking risks and exploring.  We become more passive and withdrawn from our surroundings.  This of course is a breeding ground for depression.

Over-active:  an over-active seeking system leaves us prone to anxiety and restlessness.  We may find ourselves driven by a feeling of perpetual scarcity.  When our seeking system is too active, everything is a means to an end – there is no such thing as an end in itself.  We have a hard time just being with ourselves and others.  There is always somewhere else to be, somewhere else to go, either physically or psychologically.  This leaves us prone to addiction and other escapist behavior.  It can disrupt our sleep cycle and keep us in a loop of anxiety.

The rage system:

The rage system evolved to protect us from threats to our safety.  When the rage system activates, our bodies become mobilized and prepared to defend ourselves or those we love from something dangerous or predatory in our environment.  Our aggression can be used to intimidate or to engage in physical violence to protect ourselves and defend our boundaries.

A balanced and well-functioning rage system allows us to feel fundamentally safe in the world.  When we can trust our own capacity to keep ourselves safe, we live with a degree of self-assuredness and confidence that allows us to take risks, explore the world around us, and engage openly with others.  With our need for safety taken care of, we are free to express ourselves, to love, play and celebrate life.

Under-active:  when our rage system is under-active, we are more timid and insecure.  We are avoidant of new experiences, we don’t take as many risks, and we tend to isolate and withdraw from connection.  We live in a state of anxiety and worry, and we do not feel free to express ourselves.  We fear conflict and shy away from challenging situations, keeping us stuck and at odds with ourselves.

Over-active:  an over-active rage system makes us impulsive and unpredictable.  We perceive threats to our safety where there are none, making us too guarded to connect with people.  Always on the lookout for potential boundary violations, we are like a walking land-mine, which scares people off and leaves us feeling isolated and alone.  We are also more likely to act out our anger in destructive ways and do serious harm to others.

The fear system:

The precursor to the rage system, fear operates as the alarm that makes us aware of a potential threat to our safety.  A well-balanced fear system keeps us alert and appropriately aware of our surroundings.  When we are young, the fear system motivates us to seek out our caregivers to protect us.

Under-active:  an under-active fear system renders us less alert and less aware of our surroundings.  We likely experience an exaggerated sense of confidence in our abilities, which can be a major liability when we are in situations that are genuinely dangerous.  We may put ourselves in threatening situations without knowing it, jeopardizing our safety.

We may also be less likely to seek support from others when we are in distress.  If we don’t experience healthy fear, we operate with a sense of excessive independence which keeps us from deeply attaching to and relying on others in times of need.

Over-active:  an over-active fear system puts us in a consistent state of anxiety.  When the alarm that spells danger is always going off, it puts our bodies in fight-or-flight mode and keeps us in that state of heightened arousal even when no threat is present.  This wreaks havoc on our bodies and minds and leaves us prone to obsessive thinking and rumination.  We are too preoccupied to enjoy ourselves and those around us.  The constant worrying absorbs our full attention and our health and relationships suffer.

An over-active fear system can also condition us to be overly dependent on others to soothe us and reassure us that we are safe.  We may feel insufficient to soothe ourselves, and as adults this sense of hyper-dependency on others leads to deep insecurity and exaggerated fear of solitude and being alone with ourselves, which can put a strain on close relationships.

The lust system:

The lust system governs our experiences of sexual excitement and arousal.  A well-balanced lust system motivates us to pursue regular sexual activity for pleasure and emotional connection, or for reproduction.

Under-active:  when our lust system is under-active, we have a diminished sex drive which can leave us feeling less vital and alive, less connected to our bodies, and less close to our intimate partners.  We may be less sensitive to sensual pleasure in general and experience our environment as dull and uninteresting.

Over-active:  an over-active lust system can hijack the seeking system we discussed above, and leave us in a constant state of chasing sexual pleasure.  In relationships this can create disharmony, as the addictive pursuit of sexual activity is not conducive to healthy intimacy and emotional closeness.  If the lust system is extremely over-active, this may push us into acting out our erotic impulses in ways that violate the boundaries of others.

The care system:

The care system is the brain circuitry that governs attachment and bonding.  The most obvious trigger to activate the care system is having children, though this system is also active in intimate relationships, family relationships and friendships, and in any circumstances where we share an emotional attachment to others.

It can also be activated in our own relationship to ourselves. When the care system is balanced and we focus that system on ourselves, we become our own caregivers.  We give ourselves the nurture, affection and love that was modeled to us by our caregivers earlier in life (or our therapists later in life if our caregivers did not provide this).  This gives us a sense of autonomy and pride in our ability to have a rich, emotionally-regulated relationship with ourselves.  The capacity for self-regulation of emotion is what allows us to be good partners, friends, and parents.

Under-active:  when the care system is under-active, we may feel empty and disconnected from life.  As social creatures, we require deep emotional attachments in order to feel alive and purposeful.  If this system isn’t fully active, we may become deeply alienated from those around us and withdraw or isolate to extreme degrees, getting stuck in state of debilitating depression.   We also may be more prone to becoming impulsively aggressive or violent with ourselves or with others, as our instincts for compassion and empathy become desensitized.

Over-active:  when the care system is over-active, we operate from a state of anxiety.  We are excessively preoccupied with the well-being of whoever our care system is focused on, which can lead to enmeshment, dependency, and unhealthy boundaries with ourselves and others.

The grief system:

The grief system is the emotional circuitry that helps us deal with loss and separation.  When loss and separation occur, it can be profoundly painful.  The grief system enables us to let go of control and allow the pain to move through us in order to heal from the loss and continue living our lives.  This gives us the ability to be open to heartbreak — which also means we’re open to love.

Under-active:  an under-active grief system creates an atmosphere of indifference and emotional insensitivity, similar to that of an under-active care system.  Compassion and empathy are diminished, and we may not feel inclined to attach to and bond with others.  We may also be unable to fully appreciate aesthetic beauty when we see it, as our ability to be deeply stirred by what we absorb through our senses is diminished.

Over-active:  when the grief system is over-active, and we experience a major loss, we may find ourselves paralyzed by the pain of that loss, unable to process it and move forward with our lives.  People who remain deeply depressed for many years after a major loss likely have an over-active grief system.  We may find ourselves drowning in tears and still feeling drained and hopeless afterwards, as though we haven’t released anything.

People with over-active grief systems may also struggle with boundaries.  If we wear our hearts on our sleeves, we can’t regulate our emotional responses to others.  We become a sponge and absorb the pain of others, far exceeding our capacity to metabolize.  This can leave us more vulnerable to depression as well as addiction.

The play system:

The play system is essential for the experience of genuine pleasure, joy, and connection with others.  It is especially important early in life when we are first negotiating our relationship to peers.  The play system helps facilitate learning about healthy competition, winning and losing, hierarchy, as well as our own strengths and limitations, and our status in the group.

A balanced play system allows us, as adults, to remain connected to the innocence and vitality of childhood.  It gives us the freedom to express ourselves creatively and to experience pleasure, joy and connection with ease.

Under-active:  an under-active play system is a recipe for depression.  We become rigid and inflexible in our perception of the world, we lose our creative spark, and have a difficult time connecting authentically with others.  We experience life as lacking in color and richness.  We have a hard time feeling deeply engaged or passionate about anything in life.

Over-active:  an over-active play system can interfere with our ability to experience healthy fear.  When everything in life is a game, we trivialize those parts of life that have serious gravity.  We may be avoidant of pain and make efforts to avoid embracing the harder parts of life, which forces us to create a façade of happiness and positivity that erodes our ability to be authentic in our relationship to ourselves and to others.

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As you can see, these seven emotional circuits are deeply interrelated.  The over or under-functioning of one circuit can easily affect other circuits.  When we learn how to master these emotional circuits in ourselves, we’re tapping into the ancestral inheritance that has served our species’ evolution over millennia.  These are powerful tools that can help us achieve a high degree of mental health if we put in the time to learn how to use them.  At a time when mental health has reached a collective crisis point, the more people who are fully aware of and in charge of themselves emotionally, the better off we are as a society.