Fudoshin

Catharina Blomberg is an academic that was (or is) with the University of Uppsala (Northern Sweden). I accompanied Jan de Jong and taught with him in Uppsala. (1) A big hello to the wonderful people I met in Uppsala. (2) I'd appreciate it if anyone can inform me as to Blomberg's current whereabouts.

Blomberg wrote: The Heart of the Warrior: Origins and Religious Background of the Samurai System in Feudal Japan. We need to encourage professional academics like Blomberg, Karl Friday, Cameron Hurst III, and Paul Varley to study and write about warrior traditions, Japanese and other countries/cultures. We have enough poorly (or nil) researched texts dealing with various aspects of the martial arts.

Blomberg describes fudoshin as 'immobility of heart', and explains:

The warrior stood in special need of an unperturbable mind which could remain calm and collected regardless of his surroundings and circumstances or the pressure of events, and fudoshin became a central tenet of swordsmanship.

Referring to the writings of Miyamoto Musashi and Yagyu Tajima no Kami Munenori, both celebrated Japanese swordsmen of the 1600s, Blomberg explains that 'technical skill without the correct mental attitude was a waste of time.' You can hear this sentiment echoed in the commentary of the Australian Open (tennis) being played now. Emotion is the thing that wins and loses matches; emotion is the thing that wins and loses violent encounters. When you become attuned to emotion words, the aforementioned commentary is very often focusing on the emotional state and its effect on performance. Is this suggestive of what to focus on when preparing someone to survive a violent encounter?

Technical skill is about biomechanics. Mental attitude is about emotion. Most people involved in preparing a person to survive a violent encounter know a great deal about technical skill. What do they know about emotion?

Fumon Tanaka, in Samurai Fighting Arts: The Spirit and the Practice, explains that the essence of fudoshin (unmovable heart) is having no fear. That is to say, that no matter the circumstances (stimuli), the appraisal of that stimuli does not elicit the emotion of fear.

Emotion is a process. A stimuli is appraised, and if that stimuli is appraised as being harmful, threatening, or beneficial, it elicits a subjective feeling, physiological reaction, and an impulse to act which may or may not result in a behavioural response which is intended to deal with the initiating stimuli. Fudoshin training is targeting the appraisal process in the emotion process. Modern fudoshin training is termed stress training, stress inoculation training, or stress exposure training.

Gavin De Becker's (author of The Gift of Fear) organisation offers Combat Fear Inoculation training. 'Stress' is such a nebulous concept. It does not explicitly identify the emotion it focuses on, fear, and its close cousin, anxiety. Becker gets to the heart of the matter. He also highlights the fact that the stress discipline and emotion discipline are studying the same survival process, but the stress discipline does so in a limited way. As Lazarus suggests when arguing for the integration of the two disciplines, stress should be considered a subset of emotion.

Lawrence Kane and Loren Christensen are two well known authorities on use of force training, with a particular emphasis on law enforcement in the latter case. In Surviving Armed Assaults: A Martial Artist's to Weapons, Street Violence, and Counterveiling Force, they discuss 'combat mindset necessary to carry you through a battle.' They suggest there is a concept called 'the fearlessness of no fear' which is 'the quintessential martial mindset.' They provide a Japanese tale which they suggest is 'an example of what the Japanese call fudoshin or indominable spirit.' In the same 'breathe', they advise:

When your life is on the line, fight not only for yourself but also about those who care about and depend upon you - your children, your spouse, your family, and your friends.

Firstly, this is not an example of fudoshin. Fudoshin is instrumental violence which is violence involving no emotion. Kane and Christensen's advice concerns turning fear into anger. One emotion into another emotion, but emotion-based violence nonetheless.

In violence and aggression literature, violence and aggression are often categorised into affective or instrumental violence or aggression. Affective violence or aggression involves motivating emotions, hence why it's also called emotional violence or aggression; instrumental (also referred to as predatory) violence or aggression involves no emotion, and the violence or aggression is instrumental in realising a non-violent goal, e.g. economic reward, food.

Secondly, why turn fear into anger, IF, fight is a behaviour associated with fear? Read Siddle. Grossman, and others who refer to the fight-or-flight concept, and academics who refer to evolved mammalian defence strategies, and the fight response is associated with fear. Why change the emotion? The action tendency of fear is flight, but the aforementioned authorities are suggesting fight is also associated with fear. The more serious authorities refer to a sequence where fight is only undertaken when flight is frustrated. So, why not advise to think that you cannot escape and you are going to die? That should, in theory, turn flight into fight without having to generate a new emotion, i.e. turn fear into anger.

Thirdly, note that the abovementioned advice is about providing your own mental stimuli in order to elicit an emotional response, which, if you recall, includes a behavioural tendency. Fudoshin is concerned with the appraisal process within the emotional process, and not with the stimuli that initiates the process. Emotion is about personal meaning; change the meaning, change the emotion, or even the very elicitation of an emotion. The 'dramatic plot' of fear is a 'concrete and sudden danger to our physical well-being' (Lazarus). If you embrace the Zen philosophy that life and death are one and the same, the appraisal of a threat to your well-being is to deny any personal meaning to that stimuli, and therefore, no fear is experienced.

Fourthly, Kane and Christensen's advice echoes the advice I've heard and read relating to women's self defence. Turn fear into anger. Anger's action tendency is fight; and the fight response is supported by a physiological response designed to mobilise our body to fight. However, does not suggesting a person think about the worst thing the attacker can do run the risk of turning fear into terror rather than anger? If you believe that people, males and/or females, will always fight to protect their love ones, you are naive. 'Always' does not exist in the real world when dealing with human behaviour. We need to know more about anger. What is the 'dramatic plot' (Lazarus) of anger? Most involved in activities that prepare a person to survive a violent encounter know something about fear, and focus on fear, but what do they know about anger? Stress training, by whatever description including scenario or reality training, focuses on fear. What do they know about any other emotion, including no emotion? Very little, I'd suggest. They know where they don't want to be, but do they know anything about where they want to be?

Fifthly, what is the cost of fudoshin, or instrumental violence? Everything has a cost. What is the cost of none emotional violence? Fear and anger have a physiological reaction which results in a 'cascade of hormones' that are designed to help us fight or flee when threatened. That includes shunting blood to the muscles associated with the behaviour in order to increase our fight or flight capabilities. It includes adrenalin to help us become stronger and faster. It includes hormones that increase our pain tolerance so we are not distracted if injured when we are fighting or fleeing. Blood is shunted away from the periphery so that limited bleeding is experienced while fighting or fleeing. No emotional experience means all these evolutionarily designed advantages in fighting and fleeing are not received. That is the cost. Nobody mentions that cost - do they understand that there is even a cost to fudoshin/instrumental violence?

Lastly, we have emotionally-motivated violence and fudoshin/instrumental/no emotion violence. It is suggested that fear can produce 'defensive violence' - that proposition is under investigation. Women's Self Defence teaches to turn fear into anger; anger having an action tendency of fight which is supported by a physiological response. We can experience the evolved defence emotion that is designed to help us survive; or we can manipulate our evolved defence emotion turning fear into anger; we can control the intensity of the emotion, and while feeling fearful, our training can use will to fight instead of flee; or we can train to achieve fudoshin. Are there any other options? Yes there is. One which tends to go against all the conceived wisdom. One which has been successfully used by warriors from different cultures for millennia. What is that approach, that tradition?

That is the topic of the next blog.

PS: Rafael Nadal was just asked what he thought about Australia's Bernard Tomic. His very first comment concerned his emotions. He ended the interview with a comment linking emotions with champions.

Do you really want to neglect emotions in your training? You study technical skills, you may even study biomechanics to understand technical skills better; do you study emotion? Stress looks at fear and anxiety, but this is what you don't want; do you know anything about what you do want?

Shock and other comments on my research - reply to a comment

I received a comment to my previous blog that I thought would be better replied to in a dedicated blog.

Thanks John for the great posts on this subject recently, its certainly provided plenty of food for thought and discussion.

Thank you for your kind words and support. I do aim to provide 'food for thought and discussion', as well as to inform.

I was having a discussion with a couple of training partners just the other day with regards to your work in this area [(Fight and Defence)] and we came to a couple of interesting questions where your expertise would be very welcome:

'Expertise'? Hmmm. False humility has never been an attribute that has been often associated with me, but I confess to being a little uncomfortable with the label 'expert' - at this point in time. I do consider myself a bit of a pioneer, as I am attempting to shine a light on physical violence (defensive and offensive) which has traditionally been left to 'masters' or 'instructors', who have no real study of the theories and concepts they espouse. I gain confidence that I'm moving in the right direction, authoritatively wise, because my contact with experts in the various academic fields has been met with a collegial reception. For instance, a biomechanics professor and author invited me to co-author a book with him, even though I have absolutely no biomechanical formal training or qualifications. I've been invited to submit a paper, any paper, to be presented at an predominantly biomechanically-based academic seminar for judo. I've been invited to submit an article, any article, to a semi-academic journal dedicated to the martial arts. A US military organisation has expressed an interest in the work I'm doing on 'stress training' for Beyond Fight-or-Flight. Etc.

The first was the condition of shock - shock is obviously a debilitating reaction, sometimes even deadly, and has physiological effects on people that are wide ranging - where do you fit shock into your understanding of responses people have when 'the sh@t hits the fan'?

Socrates said: 'The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.' Always, always, challenge 'terms' when they are imbued with some special meaning. What do you mean by the word 'shock'? ONLY to respond to this comment, I've referenced an unauthoritive source to progress the discussion - an approach that is definitely NOT representative of my work.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/emotional_health/mental_health/disorders_shock1.shtml

The most important distinction to make between the different forms of shock, is between psychological (or mental) shock and physiological (or circulatory) shock:
•Psychological shock can occur after a physically or emotionally traumatic experience but it effects your state of mind (although this can give you symptoms such as palpitations and feeling faint, it doesn’t usually lead to serious physical collapse).
•Physiological shock is a dramatic reduction in blood flow that, if left untreated, can lead to collapse, coma and even death.

My focus goes immediately to the 'emotional' reference. Emotion is considered more than subjective feeling. It is a process which involves an appraisal that may or may not elicit a subjective feeling and associated physiological response and action tendency, that may or may not result in a behavioural response. Emotions are evolved mechanisms designed to help us survive and reproduce. The behavioural response (and emotional expression) are designed to deal/affect the initiating stimuli of the process. The first question is, 'What emotion are we talking about?'

Stress training, stress inoculation training, stress exposure training - it has to be understood that the underlying assumption in these training methods is experiencing the emotion of fear. The training and theory tells us where we don't want to be, fear, it doesn't inform us at all about where we want to be. It is the blindman feeling the ear of an elephant and suggesting an elephant is like a fan (see previous posts re blindmen and the elephant analogy).

The 'shock' you are referring to might be, and I could be mistaken, the evolved tonic immobility (TI) strategy in the 'defence cascade' (see previous couple of posts). TI is an evolved fear response which is an involuntary catatonic state when fight (associated with anger and not fear?) has unsuccessful provided the option to flee.

How do you combat TI? Unbeknown to most women's self defence (WSD) course developers, they have built in a training method to reduce the risks of experiencing TI when threatened. How? By teaching their students to turn fear into anger; or to at least experience anger along with fear. TI is not associated with anger, only extreme fear. So, in addition to the many other aspects of the adaptive emotion of anger, and its strategic use by these WSD courses, manipulating our emotions to experience anger reduces the risk of experiencing TI. (By the way, anger is a fascinating subject - more on that later)

This leads once again to the question of training methods - will your work once it has outlined a model for what may be / is happening to people at these critical times go on to use this to improve the outcome for people at these times - do you see value in any singular or combination of training methods that can improve peoples ability to deal with things?

My work was intended to provide the knowledge to understand what and why the various methods taught by those activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter teach. It obviously provides the information to expose the charlatans, the ignorant, the misinformed or uninformed. And yes, it can be applied to either support or improve training methods and combat techniques. And as I will outline in future blogs, even at this embryonic stage, I'm finding my work is helping people to deal with aggressive situations, and post-aggressive situations. Stay tuned.

Lastly, and reflecting on the stories and statistics you recount in your last few blogs, and especially WSD, people obviously react in different ways - do you think an individual is prone to act in the same way? What I mean by this is for instance, if someone freezes at a critical point, will they usually freeze or is the response a lottery - are responses a bit like allergies - should you test for your predisposition to certain response types and modify your training accordingly? And at what stage do you think these are programmed - is it a wiring issue we a born with, do we settle on a response type in childhood etc - these questions could have a lot of ramifications in terms of targeted training, and depending on how these responses are programmed, identify critical early training times for children / young adults.

Firstly, great question. Secondly, regarding WSD. Often, my work leads me in very, very interesting directions. I'm now very attracted to the subject of WSD. Even for the simple reason it puts my theories into sharp relief. As life would have it, for me, circumstances have conspired to fuel my interest. I was tackling the problem of the associating with the evolved fight response with the evolved fear response. As I explained in a previous blog, I witnessed a normally pleasant, intelligent, 7 1/2yo girl attack an adult surrogate uncle in a fit of jealous rage. This provided the opportunity of applying my knowledge, theories and concepts, to analyse and understand the situation, and examine proposed methods of dealing with the issue. Then, as (morbid) luck would have it, I was contacted by an acquaintance who had just emerged from a decade plus long abusive relationship. Again, opportunities of applying my knowledge, theories and concepts, and one which provided food for further research. Research that is leading to unique explanations - more on that later.

I'm not a huge fan of opinion, unless it can be demonstrated it is informed opinion. Unfortunately, as the saying goes, 'opinions are like arseholes, everyone has one'. That's kind of true, the difference being, very few people have informed opinions. I don't know the difference between an informed and uninformed a**ehole. I don't tend to give opinions unless they can be substantiated by verifiable fact.

There are definitely predispositions to act in a particular way. For instance, males fight or flee; females tend and befriend (see previous blogs). But they are only predispositions, tendencies. It was reported in Perth this week that a female passenger bashed a 70yo male bus driver because he wouldn't driver her to the city at the end of that buses route. Not what you'd call tend and befriend behaviour. An article I will be referring to is titled 'We Are Not Prisoners To Our Genes'. Anything involving human beings is complicated. Nature and nurture are involved to varying degrees to shape our responses to environmental stimuli. This then raises the question, how do you cope with this variety. Do you have a selection methodology? Where do you aim your training and technique selection methodology?

Bruce Siddle's proposal's in Sharpening the Warrior's Edge provide an interesting case study. He suggests that fear produces a physiological reaction that has detrimental cognitive and physical effects that negatively impact on combat performance. So, he advises (a) selecting techniques based on gross motor skills, and (b) to provide stress based training methods to better prepare the combatant to be effective in combat. Let's examine that. The underlying assumption is the experience of a high level of fear. Therefore, we use the 'lowest common denominator' principle; every one will experience a high level of fear so choose only techniques that are based on gross motor skills. However, the stress training is designed to manage, reduce, or change the emotional experience when in combat - effectively cancelling out the underlying assumption in the technique selection process.

Traits are different to emotions. They are long standing tendencies. People have traits. Then of course we have 'interventions' such as alcohol and drugs which affect the normal tendencies. Excited delirium syndrome is a fascinating subject that I looked into. It is postulated that the experience of this condition has increased due to the use of certain recreational drugs.

There are no easy answers to your question. Having said that, it is a very intriguing question. It goes to profiling and specialisation. Identify characteristics and develop more specialised programs. WSD, again, is a wonderful example. The female experience of, and response to, aggression and violence is different to men. WSD courses SHOULD, but often do not, reflect this specialised focus.

As always John keep up the great work, its so sorely needed - looking forward to buying these books one day!

Again, thank you for your encouragement and support. Believe me, this is a lonely, unrewarding 'job'. The economic, social, emotional, and physical costs are not insubstantial. But what else am I going to do, eh? Maybe this will be my legacy.

Fear and Defence

I am not alone!

Recall from the last couple of blogs that I'm looking at whether or not our evolved fight response in Cannon's fight-or-flight is associated with fear. Cannon associated fight with anger, but those activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter (e.g. military CQC, law enforcement physical methods, martial arts, self-defence, and in particular women's self defence) who refer to fight-or-flight tend only to refer to fear. This should not be surprising given they are referencing the work of the stress discipline to inform their understanding. Stress is associated with anxiety (a close cousin of fear) and fear, either as a stimuli or a response, or as a stimuli, part of the stress process, or the output of the stress process.

While researching today, I came across a book review by Dr. Sergio Pellis, Department of Psychology, University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. He reviewed FEAR AND DEFENSE, edited by Paul F. Brain, Stefano Parmigiani, Robert Blanchard, and Danillo Mainardi. London: Hawood Academic Publishers, 1990.

Blanchard distinguishes between two types of attack behaviours: defensive attack and offensive attack. Defensive attack is associated with high levels of fear, while offensive attack is associated with anger.

Where does fear fit into this schema? Clearly, the implication in the title of this book is that 'fear' and defense go together and that such systems should be differentiated from aggression. ... But do you really have to be afraid in order to defend yourself? This question is rarely asked and is never adequately addressed.

This question is precisely the question I'm asking now. I would have to agree with Pellis though, it is a question that appears to never be adequately addressed.

Nonetheless, the question of whether it is necessary to be afraid in order to defend yourself remains unanswered.

Yes it does remain unanswered, however, at the very least I'm researching the question and bringing the issue to the attention of those who use fight-or-flight in a practical way - to better prepare a person to survive a violent encounter.

Interestingly, Pellis is an aikidoka (aikido practitioner). I obviously have a background in martial arts. Does this background predispose us to apply the theoretical to the practical and ask: is our evolved fight behavioural response associated with fear as many, academics and non-academics, would suggest?

Again, in reference to martial arts, the vast amount of training is designed so that defensive movements become automatic responses, in that they can occur independently of autonomic reactions and thoughts characteristic of fear. That is, you can block a blow that comes to within a few centimeters of your nose without having your heart thumping like crazy. I can certainly imagine that no matter how effectively I defend myself from a street mugger, I would certainly experience 'fear'.

Certainly experience fear? Sergio, my Beyond Fight-of-Flight investigates the fight-or-flight concept based on my attempt to understand why I did not experience fear when I was attacked by a knife-wielding attacker on a train in the south of France. It investigates why I didn't experience fear, nor any of the physiological responses that, according to Siddle, would cause catastrophic deterioration of my motor and cognitive functions, which decrease my combat effectiveness. Do not immediately assume you will experience fear when involved in an aggressive or violent encounter. I had only 3-4 years training when I had my knife attack. Don't be so sure you would have experienced fear - trained or untrained.

Why bother? I can hear that question being asked by the very same people who will refer to this knowledge to provide support for their own methods. Grossman, in On Combat: The Psychology and Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and in Peace, states that 'just as a fireman has to know all about fire, you have to know all about violence.'Agreed! But does focusing on fear-based responses allow you to know all about violence? Good God no. This fear-based understanding is obtained by one of the blindmen who are attempting to describe an elephant by touching just one part of the beast. That blindman is the stress discipline: Each in his own opinion, exceeding stiff and strong, though each was partly in the right, and all were in the wrong!In Beyond Fight-or-Flight, I'm trying to gather all the blindmen's observations and present a more complete picture of the violence/combat elephant.

Fight or Flight - Did Walter Cannon Get It Wrong? - Revisited

I received the following comment in response to my original post questioning whether the founder of the fight-or-flight concept got it wrong:

It seems to me that John Coles has taken his research and conclusions along similar directions, and has defined what I had been thinking in better terms than I did. His work will make it much easier to get this across to serious students of martial arts.

Firstly, I thank you for those kind words and encouragement. Secondly, the aim of my work is to not only make it easier to get concepts across to serious students of any activity associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter, but also to clarify or correct the commonly held misconceptions.

Fight and flight are evolved behaviours to a threat and are often associated with fear. In Sharpening the Warrior's Edge, Siddle explains that 'fear initiates the sympathetic nervous system, which begins a catastrophic spiral in motor and cognitive functions' (1997: 9). This feeling and physiological response 'occurs resulting in a desperate irrational response: fight, flight, or freezing in place' (1997: 61).

When updating or expanding on Cannon's original fight or flight options, the common constant or the underlying assumption is the association with fear. To progress this discussion I'll refer to the defence cascade of Marx et el who identify: freeze (stop, look and listen), flight, fight, if fight is successful flight, if fight is unsuccessful tonic immobility (TI) - in that order. Some add faint after TI as an evolved response (see previous posts).

It has been found that different emotions have different physiological reactions. For instance, the blood is redirected to the muscles associated with the primary action tendency of fear - flight. The blood is redirected to the muscles associated with the action tendency of anger - fight. Blood is directed to the arms and hands when anger is experienced as they are used in fighting whereas they are not so used in fleeing. The physiological reaction supports the function of the emotion.

If fight is a behavioural response associated with the emotion of fear, it has to be an inferior version to that associated with anger, simply because of the physiological response which prepares the body for the principle action tendency of the eliciting emotion. Would an inferior version of fight be selected for when we need it the most? That is, would evolution provide us with an inferior version of fight when we are threatened and flight has been obstructed.

Cannon associated flight with fear and fight with anger. A fact that is little appreciated, if known, by those activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter who refer to fight-or-flight, or stress. But Cannon also suggested that the same physiological response is experienced with both fear and anger; a proposition that has since been disproven.

Is fight associated with fear?

Blanchard and Blanchard distinguish between two types of attack behaviours: defensive attack and offensive attack. Defensive attack is associated with high levels of fear, directly motivated by danger of harm or death to the individual, and is directed at the source of the danger. Offensive attack is associated with anger, directly or indirectly motivated by resource control, and particularly elicited by challenge to such control. Violence and aggression is often classified in the literature into two broad categories: affective and instrumental. Affective involves emotions and instrumental does not. The emotion most often associated with affective aggression and violence is anger, although, Meloy refers to fear and/or anger. This is suggesting that fight behaviour might be associated with fear.

I've been discussing this issue with forensic psychologist, Jane Ireland, from the University of Central Lancashire in the UK (gratitude for her generous support). In her book concerning bullying in prisons, she refers to the fight-or-flight concept and acknowledges Cannon's original association of flight with fear and fight with anger. However, she suggests that in a prison setting that fight is also motivated by fear.

The answer to my question is not readily apparent, which is appreciated by Ireland: 'I think the problem is the lack of an integrated theory' - too true.

While researching and thinking about this issue, I witnessed a normally pleasant 7 1/2yo girl attack an adult surrogate uncle (SU) with a wooden sword used as an acting prop. A serious attack to the head, thankfully fended off, in a moment of rage. The provocation for the attack was the SU's expression that a recently arrived 6yo girl in our flats was more intelligent than the other young girl who, until then, had been the sole child in the flats. She is doted on by her mother, and by the other residents within the flats. So, jealousy reared its ugly head and was expressed in an uncharacteristic violent display.

When I thought about this experience (as is my analytical want), fight is not the action tendency of jealousy. Fight is the action tendency of anger. How did we get fight with jealousy; which is much the same question as how do we get fight with fear.

Without going through the myriad of theories associated with jealousy, I'll refer to Nesse and Ellsworth's goal pursuit explanation of emotions. They suggest emotions change depending on the progress towards the particular goal of the emotion. Based on this approach, you could suggest the 4F model above: freeze = anxiety, flight = fear, fight = anger, TI = terror. This emotional (which includes feelings, physiological reactions, action tendencies, and behaviours) flexibility might be supported in that it has been shown that freeze, flight, and fight are associated with sympathetic nervous system domination, while TI and fainting is associated with parasympathetic nervous system domination.

Is anger a part of jealousy? Some suggest that anger is a complex emotion involving anger, love, and fear. So, depending on the circumstances, one or the other emotion may become dominant. This would fit in with the goal pursuit explanation. But Plutchik suggests anger and fear are polar opposites and cannot be experienced together.

Is anger a way of coping with jealousy? That is to say, the output of the jealousy emotion process is anger, which then becomes its own emotion process.

Gilligan (not from Gilligan's Island) is a psychologist who works in prisons and prison hospitals. He explains:

These observations, and many others like them, convinced me that the basic psychological motive, or cause, of violent behaviour is the wish to ward off or eliminate the feeling of shame and humiliation – a feeling that is painful and can be intolerable and overwhelming – and replace it with its opposite, the feeling of pride.

He quotes Scheff and Retzinger: 'a particular sequence of emotions underlies all destructive aggression: shame is first evoked, which leads to rage and then violence.' Shame -> anger -> violence; fear -> anger -> violence.

The direct association of the emotion of anger with fight when threatened and with flight frustrated also fits in with the frustration-aggression hypothesis. It also makes sense when considering the optimal evolved fight response when we need it most.

I'm still researching this issue. I'm also still considering the implications of this issue. If the fear -> anger -> fight is the explanation for our evolved response when threatened, then all those activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter who refer to the fight-or-flight concept and only refer to fear are, at the very least, demonstrating a simplistic understanding of our evolved response to a threat.

If fear is associated with fight, then why turn fear into anger as many women self defence (WSD) courses teach (see previous blogs)? Instead of teaching methods for their students to get angry, why not teach them methods to become more fearful by appraising the situation as having no flight option. After all, they are already experiencing fear, all you're doing is ratcheting it up a notch. But if the evolved response to deal with a threat is to turn fear into anger, then the WSD courses are simply working with nature rather than against it. Using nature's strategy.

It's interesting to consider the same issue from a legal or even moral perspective. Self defence is often described in terms of fear-based violence, assault or manslaughter in terms of anger-based violence, and murder based on instrumental (no emotion) violence. If self defence, instinctive or trained, involves turning fear into anger, where does that leave self defence? A rhetorical, or philosophical, question.

Women's Self Defence Courses - Effective or Not? Pt 2

This is part two of an as unyet defined number of posts based on a study on the effectiveness of women's self defence (WSD) training that I came across while researching Beyond Fight-or-Flight : L.R. Brecklin and S.E. Ullman, 2005, 'Self-Defense or Assertiveness Training and Women's Responses to Sexual Attacks', Journal of Interpersonal Violence 20(6): 738-762. The study investigated the relationship of self-defense or assertiveness training and women’s physical and psychological responses to subsequent rape attacks. This post will look at the results of the study.

The present study will examine the effects of self-defense or assertiveness training on sexual assault victims using data from 3,187 female college students through the National Survey of Intergender Relationships conducted by Mary Koss. Several published studies have been conducted using this national data set (...); however, no study has examined the relationship between self-defense or assertiveness training and women's responses to sexual attacks. Because there is limited research available on this important topic, this study will be the first using a national sample to examine whether self-defense or assertiveness training is associated with a decrease in women's sexual victimization. Until primary prevention of rape occurs, women should have access to tools for responding to this threat.

There are many 'opinions' concerning the effectiveness of WSD courses - mostly uninformed opinions. I've discovered there is a large body of research associated with WSD and sexual assault; but that research lies buried in academic journals and those who could most benefit from that knowledge do not have access to it. This in part reflects the prevailing tendency of self defence instructors and developers (no matter the discipline, and not restricted to WSD) to rely on commonly conceived or their own 'understanding' rather than adequately informing their knowledge base.

A national sample of 3,187 female college students from 32 institutions of higher education across the United States was administered an anonymous self-report questionnaire. ... For the sample, there was a 98.5% response rate.

The majority of the 1,623 victims in this sample were White (89.1%), unmarried (88.2%), lived off campus (60.4%), and were an average of 21.7 years old at the time of the survey.

Go back one step. A national sample of 3,187 female college students were administered a questionnaire and there was a 98.5% response rate. That is 3,139 respondents, of which 1,623 were categorised as 'victims' based on their responses. 51.7% of the female respondents reported having experienced some form of defined sexual victimisation. This alarming finding does not even rate a mention in the study. Given I have three adopted nieces who are 19 (twins) and 22, this finding registers with the urgency of an air raid siren during the height of the Blitz in WWII London for me.

Unwanted sexual contact was defined as women who experienced unwanted fondling or kissing without attempts at sexual intercourse because of a man’s continual arguments or pressure, his misuse of authority, threats of physical harm, or actual physical force. The group labeled sexual coercion included women who experienced sexual intercourse following the man's use of continual arguments or his misuse of authority but without threats of force or direct physical force. Attempted rape was assessed with two questions (e.g., 'Have you had a man attempt sexual intercourse [get on top of you, attempt to insert his penis] when you didn’t want to by threatening or using some degree of force [twisting your arm, holding you down, etc.], but intercourse did not occur?'). The second question assessing attempted rape using similar phrasing asked about attempted intercourse where the offender gave the victim alcohol or drugs. Completed rape was assessed with several questions meeting the legal definition of rape (e.g., 'Have you had sexual intercourse when you didn't want to because a man threatened or used some degree of physical force [twisting your arm, holding you down, etc.] to make you?').

This brings home to me that, in addition to protecting their daughters, parents have a responsibility to educate their sons about appropriate sexual behaviour. WSD course participants are mothers, or may become mothers.

I decided to suggest to people who wanted to buy me presents for Christmas to donate to CARE Australia. CARE Australia is an Australian charity and international humanitarian aid organisation fighting global poverty, with a special focus on empowering women and girls to bring lasting change to their communities. Why focus on empowering women and girls? Because, 'our research has shown that if we help one women out of poverty, she'll bring four others with her.' Mothers can influence the boy, and shape the man he becomes. Who better to teach the boy who becomes a man how to respect women than a women who the boy respects. Mothers can influence future generations of males far more effectively than any government or private institution initiated male 'education' program.

Sexual victimization severity for the sample was as follows: unwanted sexual contact (27.3%), sexual coercion (21.1%), attempted rape (22.6%), and completed rape (29.0%).

Of the 51.5% respondents who reported some form of defined sexual victimisation, 26.7% of respondents reported being subjected to an attempted rape or a completed rape. Now we are getting back to the 1 in 4 women experience rape or attempted rape statistic that is often quoted.

The victim offender relationship characteristics were: stranger 6.4%, acquaintance 44.5%, and intimate 49.5%. These findings are consistent with the common findings that the vast majority of rapes are attempted by familiars. This fact has huge implications in terms of understanding survivor's responses. Think about it. 80%-90% of all sexual assaults on a female are perpetrated by an acquaintance or an intimate. It is a very different scenario being attacked by a stranger than being attacked by someone you know, trust, and care about to varying degrees. The change in mindset that is required, in an instant, to defend yourself is ... inconceivable. It goes against our evolved natures.

The abovementioned fact has huge implications for WSD training and course development as well.

Self-defense training prepares women both mentally and physically for potential assaults (...) by providing them with opportunities to learn, observe, and practice physical, social, and cognitive skills through the use of role-plays, discussion, and simulation exercises (...). ... Women’s self-defense lessons often include learning how to create impromptu weapons (e.g., comb, keys) and how to use body parts (e.g., fists, elbows, knees) against the offender’s particularly vulnerable body targets (e.g., eyes, jaw, nose, groin) in various situations (...).

Stress training, stress inoculation training, stress exposure training, reality based training, etc. are methods designed to increase the effectiveness of the participants in 'real-life' situations by exposing the participants to simulated experiences. ... Can you see where I'm going? Most WSD courses have an implication, or are actually based on, stranger-attack/rape. Stranger-attack/rape make up a very small percentage of attacks/rapes on females. Stranger-attack/rape involves a very different mental/emotional experience than attack/rape by an acquaintance or an intimate. Do the WSD courses teach social and cognitive skills to cater for the latter, more prevalent, scenario? Do they use role-plays and simulation exercises featuring acquaintances or intimates as the threat?

I'm reading about WSD courses where women are taught to attack vulnerable parts of the attacker's anatomy. Sometimes with lethal effect. The attacker for training purposes is suited up with padded outfits. Some courses do not allow the men playing the 'attacker' to interact with the female participants of the course. How does not allowing the women to identify with their 'attacker' during training support the 'reality based' training methodology?

Is not referencing the 'typical attacker' in these WSD courses detrimental to the effectiveness of these courses? Or, does the 'non-reality' based methodology actually better prepare the participants for reality? I do not profess to have the answers (yet), but, course developers, instructors, and participants should be aware of, and understand, the questions; and the course developers and instructors should be expected to understand and explain the underlying assumptions of their course and methods.

'Close to one half of victims reported they used alcohol (41.6%), and their attacker used alcohol (50.9%) prior to the incident.' This should come as no surprise. Alcohol is a factor in a significant proportion of crimes and tragedy. Instructors should never shirk the issue of raising this fact for fear of being categorised as a 'wowser'.

FPR = forceful physical resistance; NFPR = nonforceful physical resistance, e.g. fleeing, blocking blows; FVR = forceful verbal resistance, e.g., screaming, yelling at, or threatening offender; and NFVR = nonforceful verbal resistance e.g., pleading, begging, reasoning.

To assess victim resistance, respondents were asked, 'id you do any of he following to resist his advances?'including the following categories: (a)turn cold; (b) reason, plead, quarrel, or tell him to stop; (c) cry or sob; (d) scream for help; (e) run away; and (f) physically struggle, push him away, hit, or scratch. Respondents were asked to check either no or yes for each type of resistance. Those victims who physically struggled, pushed, hit, or scratched their offenders were coded as using FPR, and victims who ran away were coded as using NFPR. FVR included those victims who screamed for help, whereas NFVR was coded as present for victims who cried, sobbed, reasoned, pleaded, quarreled, or told the offender to stop.

Findings: FPR 47.4%, NFPR 9.5%, FVR 6.4%, and NFVR 78.9%.

'Eighty-two percent of the victims used at least one type of resistance strategy.' A word on 'resistance'. Jan Jordan, 2005, 'What Would MacGyver Do?: The Meaning(s) of Resistance and Survival', Violence Against Women 11: 531-559:

Rape resistance is, at best, a thorny issue; at worst, an expectation by which victims of rape are assessed and judged. On one hand, women have been told that a little resistance is all it takes to fend off a rapist; it is only by submitting that a woman 'gets herself' raped (...). Hence criminal justice system agencies have interpreted physical injuries to the woman as evidence of her resistance, construing these as necessary indicators of a lack of consent (...). On the other hand, the prevention advice often given to women has been not to resist, that resistance may anger a rapist and provoke greater injury, even death (...). In the face of such contradictory advice, the message to women is chillingly clear — women are damned if they do and damned if they don't. Although women are socialized against being aggressive and expected to be submissive in their relationships with men, 'The irony is that when confronted with a rapist who is physically stronger and may be armed, a woman is suddenly expected to struggle, fight, and resist to a degree not otherwise expected' (Burgess, 1999, p. 8).

'Irony' is not a description that leaps to mind when I think about the world my adopted nieces face in this regard.

Traditional police advice often urged women, when attacked, not to resist. Police advice to women suggesting they submit to rape has been criticized on several grounds (...). First, it reflects a view of rape as simply unwanted sex—give in and let him have his way with you, and you will be okay. As Stanko (1990) pointed out, the woman is not submitting to sex but to rape, a vast violation of her body and being. The very essence of rape makes it impossible to 'submit' to; rape by definition implies being taken against one's will. Second, there are times when women, when attacked, have decided not to resist physically; however, to portray this as submission ignores the mental component involved. Submitting to his will is a different prospect from evaluating the situation and determining that physical struggle may not be the best strategy with a particular offender. A lack of physical resistance, then, does not denote a lack of mental resistance. Kelly (1988) was one of the few writers to have observed that 'Women resist by refusing to be controlled, although they may not physically resist during an actual assault. Resistance, therefore, involves active opposition to abusive men's behavior and/or the control they seek to exert'(p. 161).).

A sobering few words on sexual victimisation resistance.

'More than one half of respondents (52.9%) said that the offender stopped or became less aggressive because of their resistance.' This is a statistic that needs a great deal of investigation. For instance, there are studies that suggest that NFVR is not effective in preventing an attack, and might even encourage violence.

Women perceived that the offenders used a moderate level of aggression and that the offenders were highly responsible for their assaults. The victims also felt that they were moderately responsible for their own assaults and that they used a relatively high level of nonconsent or resistance.

Injury science analyses an injury event in temporal terms as pre, during, and post event. Injury science analyses an injury event in these temporal terms in order to prevent an injury, reduce the severity of an injury, and/or to improve recovery from an injury. Self defence courses ought to analyse violent events in the same manner, and develop strategies for each of these three temporal phases. Women are never responsible for a sexual assault. They may increase the risks of sexual assault, e.g. becoming intoxicated (see above), but they are not responsible for their assault. This understanding has implications for post-assault recovery.

'Women reported moderate levels of fear, anger, and sadness during the incident.' The reference to emotions is what drew me to this paper. WSD courses often teach women to become angry when attacked. The action tendency for anger is fight; and the emotion of anger energises the body to fight. Anger reduces inhibitions for aggression and violence. Anger is being used as a tool. Interestingly, another study I'm in the process of reading refers to advanced courses of the Model Mugger WSD course. The basic course uses anger. The courses that flow on from this course, often relating to the use of and defence against weapons, involves controlling your emotions. Much the same as most martial arts profess to teach. Manage the intensity of your emotions. Referring to a previous post of mine, this strategy attempts to instill learned responses to a threat that would be categorised as predatory/instrumental aggression or violence rather than affective/emotional aggression or violence.

'Approximately one half of respondents reported that they discussed their experience with someone (51.4%).' Why? Judgements. Society judges them. The law, by definition, judges them. Their family and friends judge them. We judge them. Is it any wonder they judge themselves?

I've always taught that WSD courses are not just about the participants experience of assault (no matter how it is defined). Given 1 in 4 women experience an attempted or completed rape, and according to this study, 1 in 2 women experience some form of sexual victimisation, the female course participants are likely to know female friends, family, and even colleagues who have undergone these experiences. Knowledge is power, in this case, power to help.

'Approximately one fifth of women said they seriously contemplated suicide after their index assaults(19.1%).' Post assault/victimisation strategies. If WSD courses are to be the complete package, they must cater for pre, during, and post phases of an assault.

There is a great deal of food for thought in the findings arising out of this study's questionnaires concerning sexual victimisation. The next blog looks at the differences self defence or assertiveness training has.

Women's Self Defence Courses - Effective or Not? - Pt 1

I'll use the Women's Self Defence (WSD) course developed by Debbie Clarke while she was an instructor with the Jan de Jong Self Defence School (JDJSDS) as a case study to study the issue of WSD courses generally. See http://southerncrossbujutsu.com.au/martial-arts-taught/self-defence-for-women.aspx for her current work.

Clarke's WSD course was designed as a six week course with lessons of 2 hours duration per week. Variations of the format were developed when teaching the course to female students at various high schools in the Perth metropolitan area. One elite private girls school included it as a compulsory course for all their year 11 girls.

A feature of the course was that it was designed by a woman for women based on a female experience of violence. It was also designed to be taught by a woman to women. I was the only male instructor within the JDJSDS to be trained in teaching the WSD course, and to teach it for a number of years. This was because I was working full-time for the JDJSDS at the time, and the other (senior) instructors did not hold the WSD course in high regard. They taught 'martial arts', something that has to be trained for years, with dedication, before you can be effective in surviving a violent encounter.

One thing that is never in short supply of in the martial arts is opinion. Most people involved seem to have one on many violence related subjects, and they are not adverse to sharing their opinions. One commonly held opinion, particularly by male martial artists, is that WSD courses are largely, if not totally, ineffective. Or worse, they provide participants with a false sense of security.


One thing that is also never short supply of in the martial arts is uninformed opinions. The martial arts are bastions of anti-intellectualism for the large part. God forbid that research would be undertaken in order to inform these opinions, including those associated with the effectiveness of WSD courses.

In researching Beyond Fight-or-Flight, I came across this article in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence: Self-Defense or Assertiveness Training and Women's Responses to Sexual Attacks by L.R. Brecklin and S.E. Ullman, 2005, 20: 6, 738-762.

Self-defense classes aim to prevent violence against women by strengthening women's capacity to defend themselves; however, little research has examined the effects of self-defense training on women's attempts to fight back during actual attacks. This study investigated the relationship of self-defense or assertiveness training and women's physical and psychological responses to subsequent rape attacks.

In this and the next couple of blogs, we'll look at various aspects of this study and the content of the article.

Self-defense training prepares women both mentally and physically for potential assaults (...) by providing them with opportunities to learn, observe, and practice physical, social, and cognitive skills through the use of role-plays, discussion, and simulation exercises (...). Women's self-defense tactics are meant to be practical, simple, and effective in common situations, so that all women can learn them regardless of age, size, previous experiences, and physical strength (...). Women's self-defense lessons often include learning how to create impromptu weapons (e.g., comb, keys) and how to use body parts (e.g., fists, elbows, knees) against the offender's particularly vulnerable body targets (e.g., eyes, jaw, nose, groin) in various situations (...).

Firstly, the '(...)' replaces the references that Brecklin and Ullman have referred too. This will be consistently employed in direct quotes from the article in this blog. Secondly, their description of self-defence courses corresponds with Clarke's WSD course. Their discussion on self-defence courses generally refers to numerous other studies which, unfortunately, are hidden away in academic journals:

After completing self-defense classes, evaluations have shown increases in the following domains for women: assertiveness, self-esteem, perceived control, anticipatory behaviors, self-efficacy, masculinity attributes (e.g. active, independent), anger, dominance, self-defense skills, physical competence, and decreases in anxiety, depression, hostility, fear, and avoidance behaviors (...).

I wonder, did the increase in masculinity attributes include an increase in arrogance? Note the increase in anger. What do you think that is all about? My sourcing this article had to do with research into our evolved survival mechanism and our learned survival mechanism for Beyond Fight-or-Flight. Most people do not understand that the fight-or-flight concept is only associated with fear. However, the literature associates violence with fear, anger, no emotion, and positive emotions. Each of these emotions entails different subjective feelings, physiological responses, cognitive capabilities, action tendencies, and behavioural responses. Fight-or-flight is only looking at one small part of a larger 'violence elephant'.

Studies have found that successful rape resisters were more assertive, confident, dominant, perceived more control over their lives, and showed more initiative, persistence, and leadership compared with women who were raped (...), demonstrating that psychological changes because of participation in self-defense training may have substantial implications for subsequent rape avoidance. Increasing women's assertiveness skills is especially important in light of a recent prospective study showing that low assertiveness specific to situations with men was predictive of future victimization in a sample of 274 college women (...). Empowering women with the tools to respond to threats may serve to both protect and liberate them (...).

It's not looking good for the WSD course detractors.

Although self-defense training may have positive psychological and behavioral effects on female participants, very little empirical research has examined whether self-defense training is related to actual rape avoidance among women who later face a rape attack. In Bart and O’Brien's (1985) landmark interview study of 51 rape avoiders and 43 rape victims, rape avoiders were nearly twice as likely to have learned self-defense as women who were raped. In a descriptive study, Peri (1991) found that of 8,000 female graduates of Model Mugging, a self-defense course, 120 have reported using nonphysical strategies (e.g., screaming) to avoid an assault. In addition, 46 out of 48 graduates of Model Mugging who were physically assaulted after the course chose to fight back physically and reported being able to disable the offender enough to avoid further harm (Peri, 1991). This prior research suggests that self-defense training may be related to rape avoidance for participants; however, more rigorous studies are needed to verify this relationship.

If these studies were more generally known, they could be used to support the efficacy of these WSD courses. This in turn increases the confidence of the participants in the efficacy of these courses which could increase their commitment to the instruction and the implementation of the instruction.

Numerous empirical research studies have examined the role of victim resistance in rape incidents, using police reports and retrospective self-report surveys. Victims' use of forceful physical resistance (e.g. hitting, kicking, biting) is typically related to avoiding completed rape (...). In prior studies examining the temporal order of assault events (e.g. offender attack, victim resistance, rape or injury outcomes), forceful physical resistance (FPR) was not related to greater injury (...) but was still related to avoiding completed rape. Nonforceful physical resistance (NFPR) (e.g. fleeing, blocking blows) has also been found to be related to less rape completion (...) and unrelated to physical injury (...). Several studies have shown that forceful verbal resistance (FVR) (e.g. screaming, yelling at, or threatening offender) is related to rape avoidance ...), but its relationship with physical injury has been inconsistent. Forceful verbal resistance was linked to greater physical injury (...) in studies without sequence information (...); but in one study, analyzing sequence of events, this strategy was unrelated to injury (...). Finally, nonforceful verbal resistance (NFVR) (e.g. pleading, begging, reasoning) has been found to be related to greater severity of sexual abuse and unrelated to physical injury (...). Based on this research, it appears that the techniques taught most often in self-defense training (e.g. hitting, kicking, yelling) are related to rape avoidance, implying that self-defense may reduce women's severity of sexual victimization.

Firstly, it is not uncommon to see and hear of law enforcement officials advising females to not resist a sexual assault because it is likely to increase the violence involved. The studies suggest this is simplistic reasoning - which should come as no surprise in this area. The risk of increased violence appears to be dependent upon the type of resistance, rather than resistance per se. Secondly, all of the above behaviours are identified in Beyond Fight-or-Flight in the chapter which expands upon the original fight-or-flight concept in terms of behavioural responses. The reference to the fight-or-flight concept and related theory in terms of understanding violence is seriously limited. The question that needs to be asked, and which is not in the many academic disciplines I've been researching and integrating to write Beyond Fight-or-Flight, is: what emotion is being experienced when these behaviours are enacted? Fear is the obvious answer; but what about anger? After all, the action tendency of anger is fight as per emotion theory and Walter Cannon's original fight-or-flight model.

And finally, the research implies that WSD courses may reduce women's severity of sexual victimisation. Right now, it's 15:love in favour of WSD course supports vs their detractors. Next blog we'll have a look at the findings of this study and associated comments.

Martial Arts Develops Predators

Has the title of this blog got your attention?

Aggression and violence is often classified in the literature into two broad categories. Meloy provides the following explanation of these two categories with reference to violence. The same explanation applies to aggression.

Affective violence is preceded by high levels of autonomic (sympathetic) arousal, is characterised by the emotions of anger and/or fear, and is a response to a perceived imminent threat. Other researchers refer to affective violence as impulsive, reactive, hostile, emotional or expressive. Its evolutionary basis is self-protection. Predatory violence is not preceded by autonomic arousal, is characterised by the absence of emotion and threat, and is cognitively planned. Other researchers refer to predatory violence as instrumental, premeditated, proactive or cold blooded. Its evolutionary basis is hunting for food.

Meloy developed for forensic practice 10 criteria for distinguishing between affective and predatory violence.

Affective violence: 1. Intense autonomic arousal; 2. Subjective experience of emotion; 3. Reactive and immediate violence; 4. Internal or external perceived threat; 5. Goal is threat reduction; 6. Possible displacement of target; 7. Time-limited behavioural sequence; 8. Preceded by public posturing; 9. Primarily emotional/defensive; and 10. Heightened and diffuse awareness.

Predatory violence: 1. Minimal or absent autonomic arousal; 2. No conscious emotion; 3. Planned or purposeful violence; 4. No imminent perceived threat; 5. Variable goals; 6. No displacement of target; 7. No time limited sequence; 8. Preceded by private ritual; 9. Primarily cognitive/attack; 10. Heightened and focused awareness.

Firstly, what is violence? Violence is variably defined, but can be thought of as physical behaviour that is intended to produce deliberate harm to another. Violence can be thought of as a subset of aggression, which refers to any form of behaviour and not just physical behaviour. Aggression and violence can be defensive and offensive. All the activities that teach fighting behaviours are teaching their trainees to be aggressive and violent. They may not like to think so, and mostly do not describe their activity as such, due to the value-laden nature of these terms. Nonetheless, that is what they are doing.

Secondly, the second characteristic of affective violence is the presence of the subjective experience of emotion. This is why it has also been called emotional violence. What emotion? It is mostly associated with anger, hence why it has also been called angry violence. However, Meloy refers to both anger and/or fear.

Angry aggression and violence in humans is well studied within the aggression and violence disciplines. Fear aggression and violence in humans is not. So what? Fight is fight no matter the subjective feeling, right?

The concept of autonomic specificity has shown that different physiological reactions occur with different emotions (item 1). For instance, blood moves away from the hands with fear but moves to the hands with anger in an evolutionarily designed attempt to assist a person to fight. Fear and anger have different provocations (item 4) and different goals (item 5). Fear is about reducing the threat and getting away; anger is about harming the subject. Blanchard and Blanchard suggest there are different attack patterns associated with fear and anger, which is not unexpected given that 'different emotions produce different behaviours' (item 8). However, they also explain that it is difficult to verify the different attack patterns due to the paucity of direct human studies of physical aggression.

Interestingly, while basically studying the same evolved process in humans, fight-or-flight and stress focus on fear. Those activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter who refer to fight-or-flight and stress are therefore focusing on fear-induced physiological and behavioural responses. While the aggression and violence literature tends to ignore fear-induced physiological and behavioural responses, the fight-or-flight and stress based literature tends to ignore anger-induced physiological and behavioural responses. Just as Cannon incorrectly suggested the same physiological response is associated with fear and anger, so the aggression and violence literature incorrectly assume the same physiological response is present with all forms of emotional aggression and violence.

Related to the above, what about positive emotions? Howard refers to four types of aggression and violence which includes positive emotions. Appraisal theory in the stress discipline refers to three types of appraisal eliciting a fight-or-flight/stress response: harm, threat, or challenge. Challenge would be associated with positive emotions. Challenge-appraised fight-or-flight/stress responses are largely unstudied.

Thirdly, what do all activities associated with preparing a person to survive a violent encounter attempt to instill in their trainees? What is Siddle's model for designing a survival system attempting to do with respect to training warriors? What is stress training, stress inoculation training, and stress exposure training attempting to do when training law enforcement and military personnel for operational experiences? They are all attempting to reduce fear and therefore fear responses. They are mostly not attempting to replace fear with another emotion, but rather for their trainees to enact fight behaviours with no emotion. They are all attempting to train their trainees to enact predatory violence rather than affective/emotional violence.

Do any of the texts associated with these activities refer to predatory aggression or violence, but whatever name? No. Given predatory violence is the goal of these activities, would you not think it advantageous to have some understanding of what the training is attempting to achieve rather than what it is trying to prevent? For instance, Siddle's Sharpening the Warrior's Edge explains fear-induced survival stress and its 'catastrophic' effects on cognition and motor function in detail. Nothing on no-emotion-induced predatory violent effects. It's a little like describing in detail the place you want to leave without any understanding of the place you want to go to.

Lastly, Sun Tzu said if you know yourself and your enemy you'll not be bested in 100 battles; if you know yourself and not your enemy you'll only win 50; and if you know neither you'll lose all. Does an understanding of fear-induced fight assist you in understanding both yourself and your enemy, just yourself, or neither? Given violence can include fear, anger, no emotion, and positive emotions, a fear-induced understanding is but one small part of aggression and violence. A fear-induced understanding is but one of the blind men attempting to explain an elephant by touching just one part of it. My Beyond Fight-of-Flight is an attempt to describe the entire elephant.

PS: I refer to Siddle's work, not to denigrate it, but because it is the authority in the field of applying the theories and concepts of stress to combat performance. It is obvious illustration to use to demonstrate the limited insight that is gained by referring to stress theory.