Notes on: An Overview of The Limbic System and Our Negativity Bias

'Over view of The Limbic System and Our Negativity Bias' is taken from the course 'Managing Happiness' by Arthur Brooks on edX.org.

Your brain does a lot. It is the source of your creativity, your decision making, your ability to reason and make sound judgements. It also processes emotions automatically in the limbic system.

The limbic system (sometimes referred to as the lizard brain) is the instinctual, unconscious core of your brain that automatically processes the emotions we experience throughout the day, from basic ones like love, joy, anger, and sadness to more complex social emotions like shame and guilt.

Through his work on emotional theory, psychologist Caroll Izard refers to the emotions processed by the limbic system as 'basic emotions' that keep us alive by making us react emotionally to threats and opportunities. This happens so fast, about 74 milliseconds, that we usually do not even realize it is happening.

This is very useful in certain situations, for example, if you were about to get hit by a car, your limbic systems processes fear and enables you to jump out of the way with your heart pounding to safety before you even knew what was happening.

The danger of the limbic system is when it roams free and is not controlled. That is when we become reactive and unable to manage our emotions and actions as a result.

Children have a much more weakened ability to control their emotions, which is why they throw tantrums and are often reacting emotionally to events that do not warrant it. But adults have the ability to be in more control.

The default circuit is another interesting characteristic of our brain and it is the system that engages when we are trying not to think about anything in particular. Research has shown that our default circuit spends anywhere from 30% to 50% of our time daydreaming about the future, which is known in psychology as prospection. For "go-getters" this may be even more.

Prospection is a uniquely human ability. Not only is our brain conditioned to responded to the world through positive and negative emotions, it is also constantly running in the background preparing us for what could come next in the future.

The Brain's Negativity Bias

Our brain has a negativity bias and this has been passed down to us from survival instincts that were necessary in the not so distant (from an evolutionary perspective) past. It was safer to assume the noise you heard was a predator and seek shelter, versus not, and risk getting attacked. This negativity bias prepares us for the worst and helps us avoid danger.

The issue is that a negativity bias leads to a pessimistic outlook in life that can distort reality in a modern age. These days, the threat from predators is quite unlikely, but our brains have not evolved fast enough to catch up with this change.

Simply understanding that we have a negativity bias, allows us to control it better, but also use the negativity in more productive ways.

The Disruption Strategy

The first technique to counteracting our negativity bias is the disruption strategy, which contains two elements:

1. Confront pessimism with facts. This helps us be objective about the situation.

2. Put things into perspective. This helps us realise that often times the worse case scenario is actually not that bad.

Our negativity bias can also lead us to laziness and escaping from our problems instead of dealing with them. Some people have a hard time resisting these temptations, which bring on emotions like sadness and loneliness and impair our ability to make rational decisions.

The Opposite Signal Strategy

Sometimes our limbic system works against our goals of pursuing happiness, becoming better at work and home, and overcoming our fears. When this happens we need to employ the Opposite Signal Strategy to fight these urges.

The essence of the opposite signal strategy is to work toward the goals or behaviours you want in the long-term by sending your brain the opposite signal of your natural impulses in the short-term. The purpose is to deflect our energy away from gratifying our natural impulses and direct it toward our desired goals or behaviours.

Research shows that when we do encounter difficult situations we can reorient ourselves and this allows us to bolster elements that give us meaning in life. This is called post-traumatic growth. This brings us in control of our instincts and helps us control our behaviour rather than allowing our limbic system to control it.

Negative experiences can lead to our improved ability to deal with negative experiences again in the future. When we experience a setback, there is a bewilderment phase which eventually turns into growth.

The Opposite Signal Strategy goes beyond just taking control of our minds in the short term and allows us to embrace rather than avoid difficult situations, which enhances life in the long-term. When you encounter difficult situations, embrace them as they help you engage in the world in a more healthy way and enhance the overall meaning you are getting from life.