Fear of Wolf and Bear – physiological responses and negative association.

Anders Flykt1, Maria Johansson2, Jens Karlsson3, & Sofie Lindeberg2

1 Academy of Health and Occupational Studies, Department of Social Work and

Psychology, University of Gävle, Sweden

2 Environmental Psychology, Deptartment of Architecture and Built Environment,

Lund University, Sweden

3 Grimsö Wildlife Research Station, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences,

Sweden

Corresponding author:

Anders Flykt

Department of Social Work and Psychology, Academy of Health and Occupational

studies

University of Gävle

S-801 76 Gävle

Sweden

Phone: +46-26-648574

E-mail: Anders.Flykt@hig.se / ansflt@hig.se

Key words: Fear, Bear, Wolf, IAT, Visual search, SCR, Eye movements, HR

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Abstract

Participants were fearful of bears, of both bear and wolf, and not fearful of bears or

wolves. Firstly pictures of bears, wolves, moose, and hares were displayed, eye-

movements, skin conductance, and ECG were recorded. Secondly participants

decided if a hare picture was present among moose pictures where a picture of a

wolf or a bear could occur. Thirdly, bear, wolf, and hare pictures were sorted with

good or bad words. Independently of fearfulness, bear pictures showed stronger

physiological responding and wolf pictures showed stronger negative association.

The bear fear only group showed somewhat stronger physiological responding to

bears while the bear and wolf fearful group showed more difficulty in associating

bears with good words. When a feared animal occurred during the search task,

response time was prolonged. Fear of bears and wolves seem to be driven by

elaborate cognitive processing rather than by specific fear circuits.

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Fear of Wolf and Bear – physiological responses and negative association.

The probability of humans being attacked by large carnivores in Sweden is at present

relatively small (Linnell et al., 2001), but in a recent survey 44 percent of the individuals

reported that they were afraid of encountering brown bears in the forest and 25 percent

reporting that they were afraid of encountering wolves (Ericsson, Sandström, Kindberg,

& Stoen, 2010). The figures for people with experience of living in areas with wolves and

bears are similar. Forty-two percent of those in areas with presence of brown bear report

fear of encountering brown bear in the forest and 33 percent of those in areas with

presence of wolf report fear of encountering wolf in the forest (Johansson, Karlsson,

Pedersen, & Flykt, 2012). When asked about how fearful they are of attacks of brown

bear respectively wolf, only 30% in both cases said that they feel no fear what so ever.

As fear of wolves and bears is so widespread it affects a large proportion of

humans living in areas with large carnivores and thereby also has a potentially large

impact on decision makers and large carnivore policy. In order to understand and

eventually develop measures to meet human fear of large carnivores it is essential to

know more about the mental processes involved. Up to date no such attempts have been

made regarding fear for large carnivores. Fear of snakes and spiders has been intensively

studied and may provide a useful theoretical framework and relevant comparison.

Despite that there is basically no environmental constraints for everyday life

caused by snakes or spiders, a significant proportion (12 % in females and 3% in males)

of the Swedish adult population is fearful of these animals (see Fredrikson, Annas,

Fischer, &Wik, 1996). Sweden has three species of snakes, adder (Vipera Berus), grass-

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snake (Natrix natrix), and smooth snake (Coronella austriaca), and it is only the adder

that is potentially lethal for individuals with allergic responses to adder poison. Sweden

has no harmful spiders. From an evolutionary theory view point, the explanation could be

that ancestors of humankind would have had a reproductive advantage by acquiring fear

of snakes and spiders fast, without effort, and resistant to extinction (i.e. the preparedness

theory, see Seligman, 1971), it has also been proposed that the visual system in primates

partly has evolved with respect to the presence of snakes (Isbell, 2006). Thus, snakes and

spiders should posses a very specific place in primate information processing, and may

therefore explain the large proportion of reported fear of snakes and spiders. Furthermore,

Seligman (1970, 1971) suggested evolutionary old species, like insects, rats, reptiles, and

birds, to be overrepresented in phobic or subclinical fear. Thus, human fear for mammals

like brown bear and wolf would not be based on the same evolutionary old processing.

Mental processing associated with fear for snakes and spiders have been

intensively researched. Some of the processes addressed have been attentional capture of

the feared animal, (Öhman, Flykt, & Esteves, 2001), dwell time on the feared animal

(Miltner, Krieschel, Hecht, Trippe, & Weiss, 2004; Gerdes, Pauli, & Alpers, 2009)

automaticity of responding to the feared animal (Öhman & Soares, 1994) and behavioral

influences of the feared animal (Sabatinelli, Bradley, & Lang, 2001, see also Flykt &

Caldara, 2006). In order to test for differences between fear for large carnivores and fear

of snakes and spiders, we investigated fear of bear and fear of wolf using experimental

paradigms previously employed in research investigating psychological processing in

participants fearful of snakes and spiders. As the studies investigating fear for snakes and

spider often have used participants fearful of snakes, but not spiders, and the reversed, we

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intended to select participants fearful of bears, but not fearful of wolf (BF), the reversed,

and participants not fearful of neither bears nor wolves (NF). However, did not find

enough individuals fearful of wolves only, instead we managed to recruit individuals

fearful of both wolves and bears (BWF). Reaction times, eye movement data, heart rate

change scores, and skin conductance responses (SCRs) were used as dependent measures.

Picture viewing

Several studies investigating the responses to snakes and spiders in snake or spider

fearful participants have presented the feared animal on a screen for a brief period of

time. The responses evoked by the presentation have been measured and compared

with the presentation of pictures of not feared animals or other stimuli. For example

Öhman and Soares (1993, 1994) recruited participants fearful of either snakes or

spiders and presented them with pictures of snakes, spiders, flowers, and mushrooms.

The common finding was larger SCRs to pictures of the feared animal than other

stimuli. A similar result was obtained for heart rate change scores in a study with

spider fearful, but not snake fearful, women (Flykt & Bjärtå, 2008). In that study

spider pictures was contrasted against five other animal pictures, namely; beetle,

snake, turtle, wolf, and rabbit. The pictures presented in that study covered the full

screen and the picture display in the Öhman and Soares (1993, 1994) studies had a

similar size of stimulus and distance to participant ratio. The perception of the physical

closeness to the threat is related to the physiological response (Lang, Bradley, &

Cuthbert, 1997) according to the predator imminence continuum (see Fanselow &

Lester, 1988). The participants in the Flykt and Bjärtå study showed less deceleration

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and more acceleration in heart rate changes for spider pictures than the other animal

pictures. This effect occurred even though the participants also had tasks to handle

during the picture viewing. This is important as the vigilance imposed by the task

might be a critical factor for the eliciting of physiological responding.

It has been suggested, based on eye tracking results, that when spiders serve as

task-irrelevant-distractors to spider fearful participants the participants dwell on these

stimuli longer than other task-irrelevant-distractors (Gerdes, Alpers, & Pauli, 2008).

Moreover, Gerdes, Pauli, and Alpers (2009) found that spiders are attended to faster

than other stimuli tested, but that this was a general effect not related to if the

participants were spider fearful or not. However, to our knowledge no study has looked

at gaze direction to a feared animal when that is the only presented item on which it is

explicitly stated that the participants should focus on. With the rationale that a person

can avoid or attend more reliably to a stimulus when there is no alternative stimuli

present (that may distract), it is expected that an effect would depend on the feared

animal.

Visual search

Eye-movement is a complement to other dependent measures in visual search tasks. Eye-

movements give information about where the participant is looking and for how long, it

also provides an opportunity to see if the overt attention is dissociated from reaction

times (as shown by Derakshan & Koster, 2011) which are supposed to mirror the

detection time. If snakes and spiders are phylogenic old threats in the evolution of

humans, conscious awareness should not be a necessity for the elicitation of

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corresponding fear responses. Öhman and Soares (1993, 1994) masked pictures of the

feared animal and other stimuli to prevent conscious recognition of the different stimuli,

while measuring SCRs. These experiments showed an elevated SCR to the masked

pictures of the feared animal as compared to other stimuli. This has been interpreted in

terms of automaticity, assisting the conscious controlled processing in the detection of

these potential threats (Öhman & Mineka, 2001). This idea was empirically supported in

a visual search study by Öhman, Flykt, and Esteves (2001). Participants fearful of either

snakes or spiders had the task to detect a deviant stimulus in a search array. The deviant

stimulus could be a snake or a spider among a background of flowers or mushrooms or a

flower or mushroom among a background of snakes and spiders. The results showed

shorter reaction times (RTs) for the feared animal than other deviant pictures, suggesting

a faster detection of the feared stimuli. In another visual search study with participants

fearful or either snakes or spiders Flykt and Caldara (2006) showed larger electrical

activity over the scalp for a deviant feared animal than a not feared animal at a time

window of 500-700 ms after stimulus onset. Flykt (2006) argued that the shorter RTs to

the feared animal might be a consequence of a motor preparation for handling the threat

rather than an effect of early detection. Independent of the origin of this effect, it seems

relatively stable.

To address the question if the feared animal captures attention or attention dwells on the

feared animal Miltner, Krieschel, Hecht, Trippe, and Weiss (2004; See also Lipp

& Waters, 2007) used a modified version of the visual search paradigm with their spider

fearful participants. In one condition the participants had to find a mushroom target

among 15 flower pictures and in another the participants had to find a mushroom target

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among 14 flower picture background and one spider picture (we call this an oddball

distractor). The RTs to the mushroom target for those search arrays that also had a spider

picture in the array were longer than for those without the spider picture. This result

suggests that the spider picture was taking processing resources from the target stimuli.

However, in the Miltner, et al. (2004) study, also eye moments were measured to

investigate the overt attention showing longer scan paths (i.e. time) for a mushroom

target with a spider oddball distractor in the search array than for a mushroom target

without this distractor. This delay supports a longer dwelling on the threat rather an

attentional capture, as was suggested by Öhman et al. (2001). Similar findings and

arguments have been made by Gerdes et al. (2008). Independent of whether the

prolongation of RTs to feared task irrelevant distractor is due to an automatic capturing

(Öhman et al., 2001) or a slowed down disengagement process (Miltner et al., 2004), or a

decrease of inhibition of fear evoking distractors and a reduction of resources available

for shifting attentional focus to the task at hand (Eysenck, Derakshan, Santos, & Calvo,

2007) the visual search results by Miltner et al., (2004) are indicative of fear responding

to a supposedly feared animal. Moreover, it serves as a measure of performance loss due

to exposure to the feared animal.

Implicit association test (IAT)

The implicit association test is based on the assumption that there is strong response

compatibility for pictures, words, and concepts that all are categorized as for example

Good or Bad (see e.g. Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998). Thus, when a word

and a picture are sorted into the same category (e.g. both good or both bad) the

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requested response will be faster and higher in accuracy compared to a word and a

picture categorized into different categories (e.g. good and bad). Teachman and

coworkers (Teachman, Gregg, & Woody, 2001) showed that in IAT with spider or

snake fearful participants, those fearful of snakes had longer RTs for responding to

snake – good and spider – bad, than for the reversed condition, and that the opposite

was true for those fearful of spiders. In another IAT study by Teachman and Woody

(2003) the spider fearful participants showed longer RTs for the combination spider -

good than spider - bad combination than the not spider fearful control group. Despite

the fact that there was no difference between these two groups in an IAT task without

spiders. The IAT results by Ellwart, Eni, and Rinck (2006) showed longer RTs to

spider – pleasant words than spider-unpleasant words, and this effect was somewhat

stronger for the spider fearful group than the control group with individuals not fearful

for spiders.

Combining these three experimental paradigms a research quest set out to investigate

how fear of bears and wolves affects physiological activity, performance efficiency,

and associations. Thus, in the present study the participants first got a picture viewing

task, without any additional task, not to risk that behavioral artifacts would obscure

differential physiological responding to the different animal (Moose -Alces alces, Hare

-Lepus europaeus, Wolf, and Bear) pictures. As physiological response is different for

an animal one is afraid of compared to other animal pictures even when all other

stimuli are animals (Flykt & Bjärtå, 2008) we choose to use only animals, and,

moreover, all animals from the same geographic area. We hypothesized that exposure

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to a feared animal would result in an increased physiological activity, and that eye

movements would differ between a feared animal and not feared animals. The

participants had the task to search for a hare in 3x4 pictures search arrays and decide if

a hare was present or not. The other pictures in the search arrays were moose.

Occasionally a bear or a wolf picture could appear somewhere in the search arrays, but

the participants were instructed to disregard their presence. This is a modified version

of the visual search task used by Miltner and co-workers (2004), with spider fearful

participants, in which it was expected that reaction times for target in search arrays

were prolonged when a feared animal oddball distractor occurred among moose

(Cervus canadensis) distractors. We hypothesized that the presence of a feared

oddball- distractor would prolong RTs as efficiency would be reduced. Moreover, we

also hypothesized that participants would dwell longer on their feared animal, and thus

explain the prolonged RTs. The participants were also presented with four short IAT

tasks. Two of the tasks included bear and hare pictures and two included wolf and hare

pictures, the bear-IAT and the wolf-IAT respectively. In one of the wolf-IAT and one

of the bear-IAT the carnivore required the same response as for good words while in

the remaining wolf- and bear-IAT required the same response as for bad words. We

hypothesized that it would be harder to sort a feared carnivore with good words, than

with bad words, and thus RTs would increase and accuracy would decrease in these

cases. Thus, we expected that both the participants in the bear fear group and the wolf

and bear fear group would have longer RTs, less accuracy, and to look more at the

labels used for the sorting when bear had to be sorted with good words than when

sorted with bad words (and hares with bad words), as compared to the no fear group.

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We also expected that the wolf fearful participants (the group with participants fearing

both bears and wolves) would have longer RTs, less accuracy and to look more at the

labels used for the sorting when wolf pictures where sorted with good words, as

compared to the other two groups (i.e. the no fear and the bear fear group).

METHOD

Method

Participants

Participants were recruited from a survey among people in areas with presence of brown

bear and/or wolves in Sweden. The respondents had, amongst others, indicated if they

were afraid of encountering brown bear or wolf in forest. The participants in the present

study were recruited based on their responses to this survey-item and their indicated

willingness to participate in a follow-up study. Thirty-nine persons accepted to participate

of which 37 did eventually participate, 15 (mean age 58 years SD = 13, 5 women) not

fearful of bear or wolf (NF), 8 (mean age 46 years SD = 14, 6 women) bear fearful (BF),

and 14 (mean age 55 years SD = 16, 9 women) bear and wolf fearful (BWF). The groups

did not differentiate on State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-T) scores (Spielberger,

Gorsuch, & Lushene, 1970), F<1.

Stimulus materials

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Twelve square color pictures of each of the animal (Bear, Wolf, Moose, and Hare) were

used. The pictures were mostly downloaded from different internet sites and edited to a

square format. The final selection of 48 pictures was rated for how beautiful the pictures

were and how harmless they were perceived. An ANOVA of a rating study with 27

participants showed no difference in how beautiful the pictures were rated, F<1, while

only hare was rated as harmless (4.82), with moose as less harmless (3.66), and wolf

(2.59) and bear (2.68) were rated as low on harmlessness (i.e. rated as harmful), F(3, 75)

= 110.30, p < .01, mse = 0.333, 2 = .82, and Helmert contrasts; Hare vs. later F(1, 25) =

192.78, p < .01, mse = 0.457, 2 = .89, Moose vs. later, F(1, 25) = 66.83, p < .01, mse =

0.405, 2 = .73, and Wolf vs. Bear, F < 1.

Apparatus

The stimulus materials were presented on a 22 in. (56 cm) screen. The size of the arrays

on the screen was approximately 35 cm x 20 cm, and the viewing distance was

approximately 0.8 m. The SMI Experiment Center was used for the stimulus

presentation, collection of eye movements was done with the iView X 250 from SMI and

collection of RTs with a USB numeric keyboard as a response pad was done with the

same software. The electrocardiography (ECG) signal, skin conductance and a signal

indicating the presentations of the stimulus materials were recorded by the BioPac system

(see, e.g., Frazier, Strauss, & Steinhauer, 2004) MP100, with the dedicated software,

AcqKnowledge 3.9 (see e.g., Leong, Mann, Wallymahmed, MacFarlane, & Wilding,

2001), both provided by BioPac Systems (BioPac Systems, Inc., Goleta, CA). The ECG

and skin conductance signals were sampled at 2 KHz.

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Procedure

The participants were contacted by phone. Upon arrival to the lab the participants were

informed about the study, and then signed the informed consent form. Before starting the

experiment a test screen simulating the experimental stimulus settings was displayed to

control for the visual abilities. ECG electrodes were attached (the ground to the neck, the

negative electrode on the right side about 1 dm below the armpit, and the positive

electrode at about the same position on the left side) followed by SCR electrodes that

were attached to the distal phalanx of the first and second finger on the non-dominant

hand. To avoid artifact driven responses the participants were explicitly instructed not to

press on the electrodes. . Participants were then instructed to look at the screen so that the

experimenter could control that the eye tracking camera could detect the eyes (i.e. that the

eyes were at the level of the camera and that the participants eyes were at the right

distance. If not, the screen level and the participants distance to the screen were adjusted

until the camera reliably detected the eyes. The participants were encouraged to move

their heads as little as possible during the experiments.

Experiment 1: Picture viewing

For Experiment 1 the participants were informed that they would look at animal pictures

showing bears, wolves, moose, and hares, and there would be one picture on the screen at

a time preceded by a circle that should be fixated. The participants were instructed to

look at the picture during the entire exposure time. First the eye tracking camera was

calibrated. For this purpose the participants were asked to steadily focus their gaze on a

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white circle that moved across the screen. The same procedure reoccurred as a validation

at the end of the experiment. The exposure time was approximately 4000 ms long. Forty

animal pictures equally distributed for the different animal categories were shown with an

inter trial interval of 10 seconds.

Experiment 2: Visual search

In Experiment 2 the participants were first shown an external USB number keypad used

for response collection and were demonstrated how to hold the keypad with both hands to

be able to respond with their thumbs without pressing the SCR electrodes against the

keypad causing artifact driven responses. Then participants were informed that they

would be presented matrices with 12 animal pictures and these animals could be moose,

hares, wolves, and bears. An example of a matrix (3 row x 4 columns) with only moose

was shown. If a picture of hare was present in the matrix they were instructed to press the

defined response button on the keypad with their dominant hand and that if no hare

picture was present in the matrix they should press another predefined response button on

the keypad with their non-dominant hand. This asymmetry was used because the focus of

interest was on the arrays with a target picture. A second matrix example was shown with

a hare picture among eleven pictures of moose. It was emphasized that it was only if

there was a hare picture in the matrix that they should respond with their dominant hand,

and that they should ignore pictures of wolves and bears. Matrices were exposed for two

seconds and the participants should attempt to respond as fast possible without

jeopardizing the accuracy. The participants were encouraged to try to respond while the

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matrix still was present on the screen. Thereafter the eye tracking camera was calibrated

as described for the picture viewing. Seventy-two matrices with an inter trial interval of

10 seconds were presented. Twelve matrices showed twelve moose pictures, 12 matrices

showed eleven moose pictures and one hare picture, 12 matrices showed eleven moose

picture and one wolf picture, 12 matrices showed eleven moose picture and one bear

picture, 12 matrices showed eleven moose pictures, one hare picture and one wolf

picture, 12 matrices showed eleven moose pictures, one hare picture and one bear picture.

For the later two combinations the placement of the wolf and bear pictures in relation to

the hare picture was counterbalanced. Only target trials were analyzed as the no target

trials were considered filler trials.

Experiment 3: IAT

The participants were instructed that the third experiment would consist of four parts and

that they would be informed by the experimenter before the start of each part. An

example of the screen with a different animal category in each upper corner of the screen

paired with the word good or bad (in Swedish) was displayed to the participants. The

participants were informed that the combination of the category words (e.g. bear good) in

the upper corner of the screen would be shown constantly during the experiment. Then

the participants were informed that a word or an animal picture would occur in the lower

centre of the screen and were shown examples. One example with an animal picture and

one with a word were shown. The participants were instructed that their task was to sort

the animal pictures and the words in accordance with the categories in the upper corners

of the screen. Examples like: If there was a bear picture and the category bear was written

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in the upper right corner the participant should respond with the predefined response

button on the right side of the keypad. If there was a word like wonderful (in Swedish)

and the category good words was displayed in the right upper corner of the screen the

participant should respond with the predefined response button on the right side of the

keypad. Then the participants were presented to a picture showing a list of good words

and a list with bad words in two columns. The words from these two lists were the words

to be used during the experiment. The information to the participants was repeated until

the participants were confident about their task. The participants were also informed that

before each presentation of an animal picture or a word a white circle would occur

announcing the advent of the presentation. The participants were encouraged to respond

as fast as possible without jeopardizing the accuracy. The eye tracking camera was

calibrated, a first part was run, and validation of the gaze tracking was made. Before the

next part the participants were informed that the animal categories may have changed as

well as that the location of categories in the upper corners of the screen. It was however

emphasized that this new setup would be the same during the entire part. The camera was

calibrated again before the start of the IAT task and validation was made after. The same

procedure was repeated for the remaining two parts. Each part consisted of 32 trials of

which half were animal pictures (equal amount of each animal) and half were Swedish

words (half good – corresponding to; nice, happy, lovely, wonderful, peaceful, excellent,

pleasant, and enjoyable, and half bad words- corresponding to; failure, awful, painful,

evil, mean, terrible, violent, and angry). The order of the four parts was counter balanced.

Inter trial intervals were approximately 4000 ms.

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The experimenter recommended the participants to rest their eyes between each

experiment and between the parts of the IAT task. After the experiments the participants

received a cinema ticket for a movie of their own choice and a certificate of value for a

course on training hunting dogs to track bears or a course on training dogs to ignore wolf

tracks. (Both courses were relevant for people living in the regions where the study was

conducted.) Both courses were given at the Swedish wildlife damage centre. The value

certificates were not personal but could be transferred to someone else.

Data Treatment and Analyses

The peaks of the R-waves were used for the calculation of the interbeat intervals (IBIs).

All trials were visually inspected and artifacts were removed. No attempts to correct for

respiratory responses were made, as the HR was used as an index of orienting response

(OR) and defense response (DR), and respiration is a central aspect of the OR

(Stekelenburg & van Boxtel, 2002). The baseline consisted of the two last entire IBIs

before stimulus onset, and change scores were calculated for the five IBIs following the

IBI containing the stimulus onset. For two participants in the not fearful group HR

change score data from a few trials were deleted as the participants had double-beats and

the difference from one IBI to another became unreasonable (some more than 100 bpm)

these trials were omitted from further analysis as they must be seen as outliers. The

omitted data came from different conditions. Only the correct responses were used for the

analysis of RT data. SCRs were scored semi-manual on screen. Two different measures

of SCRs were used to capture different aspects of sympathetic activity evoked by the

stimulus materials. SCR magnitude was used to establish the average deflection from

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SCL for the largest SCR elicited in the time frame 0.9 to 4 s for the condition, while

number of elicited responses is the number of deflections elicited during the same time

frame per condition. From eye movement data total (i.e. accumulated) length of fixation

and the fixation counts for specified regions of interest were used. The time not captured

by the total length of fixation was time when the eyes moved or when they were fixated

outside the specified areas of interest. All dependent measures were analyzed with

separate ANOVAs for the respective experiments.

RESULTS

Experiment 1: Picture viewing

The 3 group (bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful, not fearful) x 4 animal pictures (bear,

wolf, moose, hare) ANOVA for number of elicited SCRs showed that more SCRs

were elicited to bear pictures than the other pictures, as shown by a main effect of

animal picture, F(3, 102) = 4.61, p < .01, 2 = .12, mse = 1.315, and a Helmert

contrast, F(1, 34) = 9.59, p < .01, 2 = .22, mse = 1.877. The corresponding ANOVA

for SCR magnitude did not show any effect (despite the fact that the picture sequence

was counter balanced across subjects).

The 3 group (bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful, not fearful) x 4 animal pictures

(bear, wolf, moose, hare) x 5 IBI ANOVA for heart rate change scores in BPM only

showed that the BF group had a general decrease in bpm over the five heart beat, while

no such decrease was shown in the other two groups, as shown by an interaction effect

between group and IBI, F(8, 136) = 2.46, p < .05, 2 = .13, mse = 2.42 (see Figure 1).

To control if this difference could be explained by a stronger deceleration to

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their feared animal (i.e. bear), a follow-up analysis was conducted. An Helmert

contrast on a 4 animal pictures (bear, wolf, elk, hare) x 5 IBI ANOVA for heart rate

change scores for the bear fearful group showed tendencies for bear pictures to

generate more deceleration (-1.18) -than wolf (-0.64), elk (-0.60), and hare (-.26)

pictures, F(1, 7) = 2.28, p < .08 (directed hypothesis), 2 = .25, mse = 8.21.

The 3 group (bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful, not fearful) x 4 animal pictures

(bear, wolf, elk, hare) ANOVA for the fixation time showed that the participants had a

tendency to fixate bear pictures (2674 ms) longer than elk pictures (2496 ms) (Main

effect of animal picture, F(3, 102) = 2.73, p = .06, 2 = .07, mse = 91275, and

Bonferroni corrected pairwise comparisons, p = .02). The corresponding ANOVA for

fixation count showed that the participants fixated a larger number of times on bear

pictures (than the wolf pictures). This was shown by a tendency to a main effect of

animal picture, F(3, 102) = 2.44, p < .09, 2 = .07, mse = 90.84, and Bonferroni

corrected pairwise comparisons (p = .03).

These results suggest that pictures of bears are special in that gaze is more often

returned to bears than other animals, the total viewing time then became longer. Bears

also elicit more sympathetic activation as seen as the number of SCRs. Moreover, the

result of the additional analysis of heart rate change scores suggest that bear fearful

individuals are also responding with an increased parasympathetic activity to bear

pictures.

Experiment 2: Visual Search

The 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful) x 3 oddball distractor type

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(not present, bear, wolf) ANOVA for response accuracy showed that more correct

answers were given for search arrays with a target without an oddball distractor (9.56),

during the two seconds the participants had for their responding, than for the search

arrays that contained an oddball distractor (bear = 8.60 wolf =8.35). This was shown

by a main effect of oddball distractor, F(2, 64) = 8.31, p < .01, 2 = .21, mse = 1.76,

and Bonferroni corrected comparisons (the differences had ps < .01). No other effects

were shown for accuracy.

The 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful) x 3 oddball

distractor (not present, bear, wolf) ANOVA and subsequent a-priori contrasts for RTs

showed in accordance with the hypothesis that (see Figure 2): The BWF group showed

prolonged RTs to search arrays with an oddball distactor independent if it was a bear

or a wolf. The BF group showed a border line effect for longer RTs to search arrays

with a bear as an oddball distractor than for a search array with no oddball distractor

and search arrays with a wolf as an oddball distractor. Moreover, for this group search

arrays with a wolf distractor resulted in shorter RTs than for search arrays with only a

target and no oddball distractor. The NF group did not show any differences in

response time whether there was an oddball distractor present in a search array with a

target or not. This was shown by a tendency to an interaction between group and

oddball distactor, F(2, 64) = 2.42, p = .06, 2 = .13, mse = 13608, and Helmert

contrasts corresponding to the hypothesis for the group (not fearful group F < 1, bear

fearful group, F (1, 7) = 3.06, p = .06, 2 = .30, wolf and bear fearful group, F (1, 12)

= 8.65, p = .01, 2 = .42).

The 3 group (not fearful, wolf and bear fearful, bear fearful) x 3 distractor type

20

(not present, bear, wolf) of number of skin conductance response (SCRs) showed

more elicited responses to search arrays with a bear as an oddball distractor than when

there was no oddball distractor in the search arrays. This was shown by a main effect

of distractor type F(2, 68) = 4.11, p < .03, mse = 1.948, 2 = .11, and Bonferroni

corrected comparison (p < .01). The corresponding analysis for the magnitude of skin

conductance responses (SCRs) showed no main effects.

The 3 group (not fearful, wolf and bear fearful, bear fearful) x 3 distractor type

(not present, bear, wolf) x 5 interbeat interval (IBI) after stimulus onset ANOVA of

heart rate changes showed that an increase over IBIs (from -0.57 to 0.35), as shown

by a main effect of IBI, F(4, 136) = 8.52, p < .01, mse = 5.95, 2 = .20. Moreover, a

tendency for the BWF group to have a larger deceleration (-1.00) bpm) than for the NF

group (0.60) was shown, F(2, 34) = 3.13, p < .07, mse= 48.51, 2 = .16, and

Bonferroni corrected t-test p < .07.

The 3 group (not fearful, wolf and bear fearful, bear fearful) x 3 distractor type

(not present, bear, wolf) ANOVA of fixation count on the target showed that the

BWF group showed fewer fixations (1.47) on the target than the NF group (2.04). This

was shown by a main effect of group, F(2, 32) = 4.44, p = .02, 2 = .22, mse = 0.280,

and Bonferroni corrected pairwise comparisons (p < .03). The targets presented

without an oddball distractor (1.93) or a bear distractor (1.88) were fixated more often

than targets presented with a wolf distractor (1.66), which was shown by a main effect

of distractor type F(2, 64) = 6.13, p < .01, 2 = .16, mse = 0.109, and Bonferroni

corrected pairwise comparisons (p < .03 and p < .06 respectively).

The 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful) x 3 distractor type

21

(not present, bear, wolf) ANOVA of fixation time on the target showed that the

target is fixated during longer time if there is no oddball distractor (448 ms) than if it is

a wolf (387 ms). There was also a tendency to fixate the target less if a bear oddball

distractor was present (431 ms). This was shown by a main effect of distractor type,

F(2, 64) = 6.83, p < .01, 2 = .18, mse = 4905, and Bonferroni corrected pairwise

comparisons (p < .01 and p<.06 respectively).

The 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful) x 2 distractor

(bear, wolf) ANOVA of fixation count on the distractors showed that wolf oddball

distractors were fixated more often (0.89 times) than bear distractors (0.64 times). This

was shown by a main effect of distractor, F(1, 32) = 18.08, p < .01, 2 = .36, mse =

0.055. The 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, wolf and bear fearful) x 2 distractor (bear,

wolf) ANOVA of fixation time on the distractors showed that wolf oddball

distractors were fixated longer (153 ms) than bear distractors (107 ms). This was

shown by a main effect of distractor, F(1, 32) = 17.93, p < .01, 2 = .36, mse = 1954.

These results suggest that in general the participants spend more time looking at an

oddball distractor when it is a wolf than when it is a bear, while the bear oddball

distractor seems to have elicited the most sympathetic activation. An oddball distractor

reduces the viewing time of the target as compared to when there is no oddball

distractor. That did correspondingly reduce the viewing of the target, which lead to

fewer correct responses (during the postulated time) for search arrays with an oddball

distractor than without.

Experiment 3: Bear-IAT

22

For the IAT tasks that presented bears and hares, a 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or

wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of bear (good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (bear

or hare) of the RTs showed that only the BWF group had slower responses when

bear was sorted with good words (871 ms) than with bad words (804 ms) while this

effect was not present in the not fearful (good words 817 ms bad words 830 ms) or

the BF group (good words 813 ms bad words 837 ms). This was shown by an

interaction effect between group and sorting of bear, F(2, 31) = 4.83, p < .02, 2

= .24, mse = 5832, and subsequent simple contrasts. The corresponding ANOVA for

correct answers during the second available for responding showed that bear

pictures was responded at to a larger extent (5.34 times) than was hare pictures

(4.51 times), as shown by an main effect of animal picture, F(1, 31) = 6.83, p <. 02, 2

= .18, mse = 3.26. This is mainly due to that less accuracy occurs for Hare pictures

when they should be sorted with bad words (3.91- 49%) than when sorted with

good words (5.11 – 64%), this was shown by an interaction effect between sorting

of bear and animal picture, F(1, 31) = 6.61, p < .02, 2 = .18, mse = 1.66.

In a 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of bear

(good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (bear or hare) of number of elicited SCRs it

was shown that sorting bear with good words and hare with bad words elicited

more SCRs (1.17) than when categorizing bear with bad words and hare with good

words (0.70). This was shown by a main effect of sorting of bear, F(1, 33) = 5.87, p

< .03, 2 = .15, mse = 1.28. In a 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or wolf and bear fear) x 2

sorting of bear (good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (bear or hare) of SCRs

magnitude it was shown that the BWF group showed smaller responding to bear

23

than hare pictures when sorted bear sorted with bad words and hare sorted with

good words, while no such difference was shown for any other condition. This was

shown by a three-way interaction effect between group, sorting, and animal picture,

F(2, 33) = 3.83, p < .04, 2 = .19, mse < 0.001, and subsequent follow-up tests, t(13) =

2.37, p < .04, d = .0.84.

The 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of bear

(good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (bear or hare) for the HR change scores

between the IBI before and the IBI after the IBI with the stimulus onset showed less

acceleration for bear pictures (0.56 bpm) than hare pictures (1.11 bpm) when bear

was sorted with bad words and hare pictures sorted with good words, while no such

difference between bear (1.30 bpm) and hare (0.93 bpm) when bear was sorted

with bad words and hare was sorted with god words. This was shown by an

interaction effect between sorting and animal picture, F(1,33) = 4.98, p < .04, 2

= .13, mse = 1.44, and subsequent contrasts, t(35) = 2.05, p < .05, d = 0.35, and t(35)

= 1.16, n.s.

In the 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, or wolf and bear fearful) x 2 sorting

categories (bad or good words) x 2 animal (bear or hare) ANOVAs of fixation count

and fixation time it was shown that in the group fearful of both wolves and bears

the participants had a tendency to, fixate more and longer on the area displaying the

words; good words - bears when exposed to bears pictures than good words – hares

when exposed to hare pictures, and on the area displaying bad words – hares when

exposed to hare pictures than bad words – bears when exposed to bears. This was

shown by a tendency to an interaction effect between group, category, and animal

24

for number of fixations of the words supporting the sorting, F(2, 33) = 3.00, p < .07,

2 = .15, mse = 0.184, and for the fixation time, F(2, 33) = 2.79, p < .08, 2 = .15, mse =

6404, and a-priori simple contrasts showing tendencies or differences for the group

fearful of both wolves and bears, while no such tendencies or differences where

show for the other two groups.

These results show that when the sorting does not lead to cognitive

dissonance smaller and fewer responses are elicited than when the sorting leads to

a cognitive dissonance. This effect appears in different measures and sometimes as a

general effect and sometimes as a group specific effect.

Experiment 3: Wolf-IAT

For the IAT tasks that presented wolves and hares, a 3 group (no fear, bear fear,

wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of wolf (good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (wolf

or hare) of the RTs only tended to slower responses when wolf pictures were sorted

with good words (862 ms) as compared to whenthe wolf pictures were sorted with

bad words (831 ms), as shown by F(1, 30) = 3.28, p = .08, 2 = .10, mse = 9108.91. No

other effects or tendencies were shown in this analysis. The corresponding ANOVA

for correct answers during the second available for responding complemented the

previous ANOVA by showing that less correct responses for the condition where

wolf should be sorted with good words and hare with bad words, as shown by a

main effect of sorting of wolf pictures, F(1, 30) = 9.81, p < .01, 2 = .25, mse = 6.75.

No other effects or tendencies were shown.

25

In the 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of bear

(good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (wolf or hare) ANOVAs of number of

elicited SCRs no effects were shown. Neither was any effect shown by the

corresponding ANOVA for SCR magnitude.

The 3 group (no fear, bear fear, or wolf and bear fear) x 2 sorting of bear

(good or bad words) x 2 animal picture (wolf or hare) for the HR change scores

between the IBI before and the IBI after the IBI with the stimulus onset showed that

the bear fearful group elicited less acceleration to trials with wolf (0.45) than hare

(1.47) pictures, while the BWF group tended to elicit more acceleration to wolf

(0.85) than hare pictures (0.57). No such differential responding was shown in the

NF group (1.07 vs 0.95). This was shown by a interaction effect between group and

animal, F(1,33) = 4.98, p < .04, 2 = .13, mse = 1.44, and subsequent contrasts, t(7) =

2.79, p < .03, d = 1.03, t(13) = -1.83, p = .09, d = 0.26, and t(13) = -0.50, n.s.

respectively.

In the 3 group (not fearful, bear fearful, or wolf and bear fearful) x 2

categories (bad or good words) x 2 animal (wolf or hare) ANOVA of fixation count

it was shown that in the BWF group the participants had a tendency to fixate fewer

times on the area displaying the words; bad words - wolves when exposed to wolves

pictures than bad words – hares when exposed to hare pictures. Also the BF group

tended to do this. The latter was shown by a tendency to an interaction effect

between group, category, and animal for number of fixations of the words

supporting the sorting, F(2, 33) = 2.61, p < .09, 2 = .14, mse = 10.93, and a-priori

26

simple contrasts showing a differences for the BWF group (p< .02), and a borderline

effect for the BF group (p<.06).

In the 3 group (bear fearful, not fearful, wolf or bear fearful) x 2 categories

(bad or good words) x 2 animal (wolf or hare) ANOVA of fixation time it was shown

a general effect of shorter average time fixating the area displaying the words; bad

words – wolves when exposed to wolf pictures than any other word area included in

the analysis. This was shown by an interaction effect of category and animal, F(1,

33) = 8.46, p < .01, 2 = .20, mse = 3332.03. The interaction effect also explains the

main effect of category F(1, 33) = 12.62, p < .01, 2 = .28, mse = 3332.03, and the

tendency of animal F(1, 33) = 3.82, p < .06, 2 = .10, mse = 1892.69. No other effects

or tendencies were shown.

Overall also these results suggest that congruence results in less responding,

while dissonance results in more, like for the Bear IAT. Wolves seems however to be

a less potent stimuli for eliciting these responses than bears are.

Discussion

Due to the complexity of the results (see Table 1) the discussion is divided into four

parts. Each of the three first parts restates and discusses the main results from each

paradigm. The last part is a general discussion, that integrates results from the

different paradigms and addresses them in relation to fear of snakes and spiders.

Moreover, the indentified differences between fear of bear and fear of wolf is

discussed.

Discussion of Picture viewing results

27

In the picture viewing most SCRs, most eye fixations, and the longest eye fixations

were shown for bear pictures. Moreover, the BF group showed a deceleration to

bear pictures. Bear pictures seems to be potent stimuli for eliciting physiological

responding independently of whether or not the participants were selected to be

fearful or not fearful of bears. The HR deceleration shown to bear pictures by the BF

group (but not by the BWF group) can be interpreted in two different ways. One is

that, in areas where brown bear occur (mainly the northern hemisphere), fear for bears

is a more rational fear than fear for snakes and spiders. Fear for snakes or spiders

elicit more acceleration of heart rate to pictures of the feared animal as compared to

not feared animals (see e.g. Flykt & Bjärtå, 2008). The larger deceleration of heart

rate to bears in the BF group is contrary to results from snakes and spider fearful

persons (see e.g. Flykt & Bjärtå, 2008), but may be indicative of deployment of

attentional resources (Graham, 1992) directed towards the threat (i.e. the bear).

This could be related to a need to keep track of movement directions of the bear. In

this situation decelerating heart rate response may even be functional by to avoid a

bear attack (Herrero, 2006). Another explanation would be that in the corresponding

research with snake and spider fearful participants the imminence of the

threatening animal is supposedly high with an enlarged spider or snake picture

display. In the present study the size of the bear corresponded to seeing a bear at a

distance. Thus, the difference in direction of HR change (deceleration for bears in

bear fearful and acceleration for e.g. spiders in spider fearful) could in the light of

Fanselow and Lester’s (1988) etiological model of defense behaviors and perceived

distance to predator be due to a difference in predator (threat) imminence.

28

Accordingly the bear pictures triggering a post-encounter defensive behavior response

(i.e. freezing) related physiological activity (HR deceleration), while the spider and snake

pictures triggering a circa-strike defensive behavior response (escape) related

physiological activity (HR acceleration). Post-encounter defensive behavior is related to

HR deceleration and circa-strike defensive behavior is related to HR acceleration is

supported by a proposed model for human physiological responding in relation to threat

imminence from the Lang research group (Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 1997).

Discussion of Visual search results

In the visual search task fewer correct responses were shown for search arrays

containing an oddball distractor, and there were more and longer fixation on the

wolf distractors. Most SCRs were elicited to search arrays with bear oddball

distractors. Longer RTs were shown to search arrays with a feared distractor.

Moreover, the BF group also showed faster responses to the target (i.e. a hare

picture) for search arrays with a wolf oddball distractor than for targets in search

arrays without any oddball distractor. The BWF group showed fewer fixations on

the target. The only effect that showed a clear association between animal fear and

the feared animal in the present study was the prolonged RTs to the hare targets

when a feared animal was present in the search arrays (see Miltner et al., 2004).

Less fixations on the targets was only shown in the BWF group. However, no fear

specific increase of fixation on the feared animal was shown. The RTs effect was a

replication and extension of the finding with prolonged RTs to a spider oddball

distractor for spider fearful participants (see Miltner et al., 2004). Furthermore,

29

shorter RTs to targets were shown for the BF group when a wolf oddball distractor

was present in the search array. This somewhat surprising result might shed some

new light on the processing that occurs in visual search tasks with feared animals

(see e.g. Öhman et al., 2001; Miltner et al., 2001; Flykt & Caldara, 2006). It seems like

attention not only dwell on the feared oddball distractor, but that an odd ball

distractor not consisting of the feared animal could enhance the processing of the

target present response. One reasonable explanation is that a wolf oddball

distractor serves as a safety signal for the bear fearful group. A parallel is the control

stimulus (CS-) in differential classical conditioning that never follows by the

unconditioned stimulus (UCS) to ensure that the increase in responding to the

conditioned stimulus (CS+) is due to an associative learning effect and not a

sensitization effect. The magnitude of responding to CS- tends to decrease over time

as the participants understand that the CS- signals that no UCS will follow (see e.g.

Lovibond, Siddle, & Bond, 1993, Figure 1, lower left panel, the conditioning phase).

We argue that the bear fearful participants will be more efficient in their response

as they know that they will not suddenly see their feared animal. In other words no

worries of encountering the feared animal are imposing on the available resources,

so that those could be more efficiently used. This result has implication for the

attention control theory (Eysenck et al., 2007). which suggests that cognitive

inhibition of task irrelevant information is decreased when such information is a

fear eliciting stimulus. This would be due to that the feared stimulus drives a

bottom-up process suppressing cognitive inhibition. The theory also suggests that

shifting of resources between tasks is harder when exposed to a fear elicitin

30

stimulus. Our finding with faster RTs to a target when a not feared oddball animal

distractor is present adds to the attention control theory (Eysenck et al., 2007). That

is, our results suggest that the mere possibility that a fear eliciting stimulus could be

present decrease the cognitive inhibition. This decrease in cognitive inhibition is not

caused by the actual threat but caused by the vigilance induced by the potential

appearance of this threat. In other words, our finding suggests that; the mere

knowledge that a threat could appear decreases cognitive inhibition.

That RTs are prolonged to target with a feared oddball distractor present in

the display but that the measures of overt attention (i.e. eye movements) did not

show a corresponding effect further support cognitive processing. That is, previous

results from visual search with spiders and snakes as feared animals have been

interpreted as faster detection (Öhman et al., 2001), longer dwell times (Miltner et

al., 2004), and motor preparations (Flykt & Caldara, 2006; Flykt, 2006) cannot be

the full explanation for visual search with wolves and bears. Instead we suggest that

fear for large carnivores, to a large extent, is due to a cognitive process that is rather

elaborated. That fear for bears and wolves would be driven by a specific fear

module, as has been suggested for fear of snakes and spiders (Öhman & Mineka,

2001), is not supported by our visual search data.

Discussion of IAT results

In the bear-IAT the number of correct responses decreased when hare pictures had

to be sorted with bad words. Furthermore, more SCRs were elicited when bear

pictures had to be sorted with good words. When bear pictures had to be sorted

31

with bad words less HR acceleration was shown than when hare pictures had to be

sorted with good words. Moreover, the BWF group showed longer RTs to sort bears

with good words, larger SCR magnitude when bear pictures were sorted with good

words, and showed more and longer fixations to the bear/good and hare/bad word

pair displays than to bear/bad and hare good word pairs displays. These results are

in line with the IAT-results for snake and spider fearful participants that had to sort

pictures of their feared animal with good words resulted in longer RTs (Teachman,

Gregg, & Woody, 2001; Teachman, & Woody, 2003). However, these effects

indicating cognitive dissonance are not shown in the BF group.

In the wolf-IAT all groups showed longer RTs, fewer correct responses for

wolf-good and hare-bad than for wolf-bad and hare good trials and longer fixations

to the earlier word pairs. This general result indicated a general negative

association to wolves independently of being fearful of wolves or not. Similar results

were found with spiders (Ellwart, Eni, & Rinck, 2006).

These general effects are related to cognitive dissonance. As the IAT supposedly is

related to attitudes (Greenwald et al., 1998) based on associations it might suggest that

the BWF group has a general strong negative association to large carnivores that

makes the sorting of these animals even harder than for the other two groups. They

do for example have to confirm the sorting by looking at the cognitive dissonant

word pairs used for the sorting more frequent and sometimes also longer.

Moreover, this was also associated with larger SCRs in the bear-IAT.

General discussion

32

The present results bring new and important insights for the human dimension of

wildlife management. In comparison with snake and spider fear, bear and wolf fear

seems to differ extensively. First and most important, in the present study the HR

changes and SCRs do not reliably discriminate between the feared animal/s and the

not feared animal as would been expected from studies with snakes and spiders (e.g.

Öhman & Soares, 1993, 1994; Flykt & Bjärtå, 2008). The only differential HR

responding was for bear pictures versus other animal pictures in the BF group. No

such were shown for the BWF group, suggesting that fear for bears has different

qualities in the two different groups, and thereby different etiologies. It might be

that BWF group could be compared with the spider fearful (Flykt & Bjärtå, 2006)

and the snake or spider fearful participants (Öhman & Soares, 1993, 1994) in

previous studies as a spider fearful participant was selected based on the low fear of

snake and a snake fearful participant selected based on low fear of spiders. We

know of no study where the participants have been selected to be fearful of both

snakes and spiders. When looking at the visual search results these neatly show a

replication of the Miltner, et al. (2004) results, and the present results do not

suggest that fear responding is different due to the selection of participants fearful

of both bear and wolf. The group selected to be fearful of both bears and wolves

showed responses in the bear - IAT that would be expected from spider or snake

fearful participants exposed to spider an snakes, respectively, in IAT (Teachman,

Gregg, & Woody, 2001; Teachman, & Woody, 2003). However, the group selected to

be only fearful of bears did not show such effects in the bear-IAT. Thus, suggesting

33

that the fear for bears may have different etiologies if only fearful of bears or fearful

of large carnivores in general.

The results from the present study indicate a general tendency for bear

pictures per se to result in more physiological responses as well as more and longer

fixations when the only task participants was to look at the pictures. Similar general

results for eye movements have also been shown for spiders (Gerdes, Pauli, &

Alpers, 2009). Thus we suggest that bear pictures are potent stimuli that elicit

physiological responding and more overt attention demands in a large majority of

people. This activation would then be largely unrelated to if the individual report

being fearful or not. It is reasonable to think that among participants in the BF group

only the physiological responding elicited by bears is associated with an experience

of fear. In other words, the physiological responding is appraised as part of a fear

reaction in those fearful of bears only, while others do not make the similar

appraisal. For the BWF group fear of bears seems to have a somewhat different

ground. Instead of appraisal of physiological responses to bears it seems that in this

group negative associations are the core of fear. The dissonance between good

words and bears is larger for participants in the BWF group, than for participants in

the BF group and the NF group. The cognitive dissonance in those fearful of both

bears and wolfs is appraised as fear. Thus, fear of bears and wolves seem to be

driven by elaborate cognitive processing rather than by evolutionary old dedicated

systems for fear responding.

Wolves are associated with negative words among a majority of people, wolf

pictures do not elicit more physiological responding in tthe BWF group, than among

34

the other participants. Therefore, it seems reasonable to suggest that in those fearful

of bears and wolves the negative associations have been appraised differently than

for those not fearful of wolves. It also indicates that the etiology of fear of bears and

of wolves do not differ much in those fearful of both animals, but that fear for

wolves and fear for bears in those only fearful of bears differs despite that both are

suggested to have a cognitive origin. Such explanation is supported from different

fits to a path model of fear for bears and wolfs on questionnaire data done by this

research group (Johansson, Karlsson, Pedersen, & Flykt, 2012). One limitation of the

present results is the low number of participants in the BF group. The small sample

size might results in effects that, as a matter of fact, are present in this population do

not show. That is, an effect obtained for the BWF but not for the BF group might be

due to a lack of power. However, the difference in physiological responding

between the groups was based on the presence of an effect in the BF group, but not

in the BWF group. It would be hard to argue this is a result of the small sample size.

Despite that some differences might be due to type II errors in the group only

fearing bears, the differences shown based on an effect in the group only fearing

bears but not in the group fearful of both animals strongly suggest a difference

between these two groups. It is, indeed, important to emphasize that the etiology of

fear for bear may differ depending on if the individual only fear bears or other large

carnivores as well, as this can have direct consequences for wildlife management.

Future research has to address this question with great care as one specific

intervention might give opposite results in two groups with different etiologies.

35

Fear of bears and wolves seem to be driven by elaborate cognitive processing rather

than by evolutionary old dedicated systems for fear responding.

36

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