Page 54 - Coespu Magazine 2017-2

ACUTE STRESS REACTIONS: SOME PHENOMENA

In the last news we have spoken about the stress and broadly its mechanisms, now we try to observe
some phenomena connected to the acute stress reaction.
In the some conditions, when we have in front of us a threat or we could encounter a challenge, we
feel fear or anxiety. We are going to analyze in a next news the human emotions, but at the moment

is important to distinguish the fear, like an emotions that we feel when we have concretely in front
of us the threat (we are involved in a shooting, we are kidnapped and are in the interrogation, etc),
meanwhile in the anxiety the danger is not in front of us, and maybe, we will never encounter it.
Commonly anxiety is also defined like “fear without object.
So the fear provokes a stress response from immediate Danger, and the anxiety provokes a stress
response from Mental Thoughts. The consequences are that fear carry on the “3F”: Fight, Flight
and Freezing, while the anxiety, when became chronic or when it is particularly intense and it is not
managed, is at the bottom of many disease: PTSD, Anxiety Disease, Mood Depression,
Cardiovascular problem, Obesity, etc. ,etc.
Previously we have seen when an external or internal TRIGGERS are perceived as dangerous by
the subject, and these triggers are able to alter the homeostatic system (the balance of our biological
system), the brain – central nervous system - through a series of pathways that connect different
parts and organs of the body, puts in place a series of reactions to activate the state of AROUSAL.
The internal triggers, moreover, could be not perceived, and could be represented by many stressors
like virus, bacteria, or oxidative processes (the last worry more the women for the aging of the
skin).The scenario of the stress is more complex, the but it is indissolubly linked to the human life.
Without deepen physiological aspects of the stress herein, go to directly to the phenomena that
always result in acute stress reaction.
The first is the Tunnel vision. To understand better we make some details about the organs and
sense connected to it: the visual system.
The visual system has some cells, that are able to collect and transport the waves light until occipital
cortex. These cells are known like photoreceptors, and are of two types: cones and rods. Rods and
cones are the photoreceptors located in eyes, more specifically in the retinas, the innermost layer of
tissue.
Cones, that are in a number of 6-7 millions, are concentrated in the central area of retina (the fovea)
and are appointed to color, shape and size of the objects under high light conditions. Their ability to
detect a shape is called “spatial acuity”.
Rods are around 120 million, and are concentrated in the periphery of the retina, and provide

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