Fear never forgotten

Fear recovery may change outward behavior, but research shows that real fear is NEVER forgotten. Even reactions trained to “extinction” can come back in a flash.

On page 212 of “Animals in Translation,” Temple Grandin explains: “However, it turns out that extinction doesn’t actually wipe
out the fear from your brain. It’s still there. If you teach an animal to fear
a tone that precedes an air puff to the eye, and then teach him not to fear the
tone because there’s no more air puff, he hasn’t forgotten. He stops blinking
reflexively every time he hears the tone, but all you have to do get him
blinking again is to pair the tone with the air puff again just once and the
animal is right back where he started …”

Later on that same page, she adds: “Both animals and people can ‘get over’ a learned fear. But
today we understand that getting over a fear isn’t the same thing as forgetting
a fear. Extinction isn’t forgetting; it’s new learning that contradicts old
learning. Both lessons – tone is neutral and tone is bad – stay in emotional
memory.”

Ouch … again!

When I read that, it gave me hope about new learning. But, it also added to my growing list of worries. I already feel a mountain of pressure to help Lilly cope with anything in the environment that may set her off, and now, it seems, one scary thing can put us back at square one.