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Not that I have been overly keen ever on how clinical psychology has constructed an approach to fear study and research, nonetheless, this field of inquiry cannot be dismissed easily, nor should its findings be ignored. However, they ought to be critiqued, and from many perspectives. 

"Fear" is hard enough to define, and even the psychologists have debated its definition over the decades if not longer. "Fear" for clinical psychology has always been divided into "normal fear" and "abnormal fear." Typically, the measures of such a distinction (categorization) is based on empirical easy to see parameters, like physiology and behaviors. The latter are analyzed as fitting a 'normal' pattern or not. Anything not 'normal' is considered a pathology, basically. 

But as reasonable and practical as that kind of binary distinction may appear on first sight, it raised the issue of what is "normal" and how would one actually know that "normal" at one time of history is truly "healthy" --as it seems to be assumed in clinical psychology discourse? Surely, "normal fears" are somehow developmentally, evolutionarily, and culturally normal because that's what most people go through. They are assumed as universal developmental stages of fears showing up and predominating at one point, then shifting to other fears at another developmental stage for humans. 

Now, the problem for me and many other critics of the psychology of fear (especially, the clinical biomedical schools of thought)--is that it is still not clear that normal fears are healthy and natural? What is the difference between "natural" and "normal"? And, typically, clinical psychology does not make that distinction and conflates those two concepts. Which I think is a deadly mistake, to put it bluntly. But, here in this blog I'll not cover my arguments for this problem and one can read my views on this elsewhere in my articles and books and videos over the years. I merely thought I would put up an article published in 2000, interestingly, which does a 100 years synopsis review of the literature on "normal fear" (meaning, normal fears people have developmentally). I'll let you decide for yourself the value of this, the good and the not so good uses of this kind of knowledge about fear. [my curiousity: how is "fearlessness" part of this clinical review? because, how can one look at fear without looking at fearlessness?] 

gullonenormalfear2000.pdf is by Gullone, E. (2000). The development of normal fear: A century of research. Clinical Psychology Review, 20(4), 429-51.

Sheldon Solomon, social psychology on the aspects and changes in uses of TERROR MANAGEMENT. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AOck3inyu8

THE unconscious (existential) death anxiety we carry as an animal, like no other animal, leads to us doing some of the most horrific things imaginable--called 'evil' or what you will. Solomon gives this interview on some of his latest thinking about how he has understood the role of fear/terror over his 30+ year career. TMT (Terror Management Theory, draws on the cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker's work) is a profoundly interesting research trajectory. It is trying to understand the primary motivation of human behavior and how to turn it from its negative-toxic drivers towards how to bring in positive reminders that make people more tolerant (e.g., like humility, gratitude) etc. 

What you basically ought to know is that if YOU REMIND SOMEONE OF THEIR DEATH (e.g., a "threat" of the worst case scenario)... they ultimately act more kindly towards those who have the same values and worldview, and at more nastily towards others with different values and worldview. 

Likewise, their TMT research over the decades has shown that, for example, 

a) Americans on the whole didn't like George Bush Jr. that much as a leader, but when they were given reminders of their own death, their rating of Bush went up significantly--and, the same finding was true later when they researched Americans on Donald Trump Jr. 

b) when reminded of their own death, people generally do not like to think of themselves as an animal creature and likewise do not like Nature as much and will think and act more greedily towards the environment without regard of costs (e.g., use more non-renewable resources)

c) when there are pre-existing conditions, not necessarily diagnosed psychiatrically, after death reminders the intensity of those pre-existing conditions arise and become more intense: e.g., fear of snakes is exacerbated greatly, OCD people use more water and soap to hand wash, smokers smoke more, people go shopping more, alcohol drinkers want to drink more, and socially anxious people will spend longer in the 'closet' isolated 

These are just a few examples of some of the research. And, they have also shown people become more aggressive and violent in intent towards others different than themselves, when given a death reminder (even if it is given subliminally where they are not aware they are being reminded of their death). This is all powerful social psychology and tells us what? PEOPLE ARE highly impacted by the fear experience!!! --whether they know they are or not. "Death" just happens to be on the continue of fear experiences, and yes, somewhat extreme for sure. However, the implication of this research is that people are continually doing some sort of fear/terror management all the time--because they are unconsciously (at least) aware they are going to die. 

I have given only the very skeletal aspects of this theory, and I write about in my various publications and some other places on this FM ning. I have also long been a fan of the work of Ernest Becker (e.g., his Pulitzer Prize winning book in 1974 "The Denial of Death" and another I like is his 1968 "The Structure of Evil." 

To watch my FearTalk with Sheldon Solomon a few years back go to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXzUhVTYdb8

It has long been my mission to co-ordinate a synthesis of TMT with my own Fear Management Theory. When I say: "You have fear, then you have more fear"--after a death prompt reminder, I am saying, you have more intensity of expressing the original level of fear in ways that are worse in terms of how you treat others (or even yourself)--and, the reality is this is not necessary if you are conscious of the effects of that "death threat" reminder. Now, comes the critical questions about fear management/education and how to turn this negative toxic reactivity around in other directions and/or to at least minimize it. I have suggested "fearlessness" and Solomon et al. are suggesting giving positive prompts like humility, gratitude and that research in their studies shows people are less negatively reactive following death prompts. So it mitigates things (as you'll hear in his talk in the 2021 video at the beginning of this blog). 

 CRITICS

Like all theories and studies, there are problems. One good summary of research replication problems with TMT is: https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/morbid-minds/202103/are-we-really-terrorized-thoughts-death

My critique notes, as a fearologist, of two pages on the evolutionary paradigm used by TMT core theorists and researchers [1] from pp. 66-67 in their recent 2015 book. As much as I respect TMT (terror management theory) and its universal attempt to understand human behavior (drawing heavily on Ernest Becker's work)--I find more and more  there are deep philosophical (theoretical) problems in this work and in TMT's very lens it uses to try to understand human behavior--of which it overtly focuses on fear management as a primary shaper of human behavior in human evolution and history (which I agree on as that primary shaper). However, how the TMT folks go about their argumentation is troublesome in that it seems not to be self-reflexive as to its bias as Fear Management System-5 [2] itself doing the discourse construction of the fear management (i.e., terror management) that they are describing. I won't say more... I know the above image cuts off lots... my scanner cannot figure out how to not do this... and, so, whatever, the case I am making is based on a fearological position and theory of Fear Management Systems which is core to my own theorizing on fear management/education and beyond. 

I share this note-taking and text from their book--so as to stir up and truth out what is actually going down with TMT these days, as it grows in popularity and applications, but needs a lot more critique than it gets, but that ought to come from specialized fields like fearology that study fear management--from a transdisciplinary perspective--unlike TMT itself which is still social psychology-based, and what I point to in my notes here somewhat, it is dominated by existential-cognitivism (and, the ideology of that way of thinking, of that empiricial paradigm of experimentalism and of general modernist thinking for the most part)--these, latter terms I throw out here because they need a lot more clarification as critique of TMT, I realize, but they are coming to me as I study TMT more and more. I'll leave this here... a much larger work is required for a thorough challenge to these dominating hegeomonic and paradigmatic components of TMT, which is a terror management theory (i.e., fear management theory) that is dubious on several grounds, as I say, its bias as FMS-5 itself and as existential-cognitivism. Oh, and on top of that, I keep wondering if Ernest Becker himself, if he were alive today, would be 'happy' on all levels as to the integrity (or not) of TMT, which the latter is supposed to be based on Beckerian philosophy and theories. Questions need to be asked. Another question I keep asking myself and have not fully answered it is: What would make a fearlessness psychology today? And, I look to TMT, and other theories, and I am not satisfied they would meet the criteria, although, they may not even want to--yet, they are, as I see it, on the way to such a fearlessness psychology--arguably, the latter takes humanity beyond fear-based psychologies (and FMSs) themselves. The Fear Problem cannot be solved by fear-based psychologies (and their concomitant fear-based curricula of fear management/education; and TMT is included because it is FMS-5 under my classification system). 

[p.s. for more FM blogs on TMT search this website and/or go to https://fearlessnessmovement.ning.com/blog/fearanalysis-2-wilber-s-induction-to-terror-management-theory

Notes: 

1. Solomon, S., Greenberg, J. & Pyszczynski, T. (2015). The worm at the core: On the role of death in life. Random House. [although TMT has many authors and researchers now a days, these three are the core co-founders of the theory]; and note, they do not cite my 31 years of researching fear management

2. Fear Management Systems theory, way too complex to outline here, is evolutionary too--but best to check my thinking out as delineated in general in Fisher, R. M. (2010). The world's fearlessness teachings: A critical integral approach to fear management/education in the 21st century. University Press of America/Rowman & Littlefield; note, my cursory classification of the discourse domination in TMT (using pp. 66-67 as exemplar) also includes, besides FMS-5, some FMS-6b (typical of most all existentialist discourses on fear management). FMS theory, revolves around and upon the evolution of consciousness theorizing of Ken Wilber, integral philosopher, amongst others. In my version of FMS theory there are ten evolved 'structures' for doing fear management (or terror management, it matters not), I name them FMS-0 to FMS-9. You can see, TMT's largely FMS-5 is modernist and 1/2 way in terms of complex fear management systems available on this planet. That's great ,but in a sense it is 'half-baked' or 'half way' on the way to even better fear management systems. That said, FMS theory (integrally-informed) holds that no one FMS of the ten is absolutely more functional than any other--all have a role to play in the evolution of consciousness (individuals, and cultures). 

I have just published a new Tech Paper 94.pdf, "Dialogue Between Terror Management Theory and Fear Management Education" based upon my recent FearTalk 9 with guest Sheldon Solomon, one of the core founders of TMT and other materials in which we both are looking at how to bring our work together in a new synthesis. 

1. R. Michael Fisher,[i] Ph.D.  2020       Technical Paper No. 94

                                                          Abstract

There’s something ‘wrong’ in the field of fear management, the author had expressed in his 2010 tome, The World’s Fearlessness Teachings. Using a transdisciplinary approach to fear and fearology, he has sought how best to engage other theories. Within philosophy of existentialism (a la Ernest Becker) and the applications to social psychology (empirical studies of human behavior via Pyszczynski et al.), he found their contributions on terror (fear) management intriguing. The author, a specialist in fear management/education (FME) has been citing and at times teaching about terror management theory (TMT) since the early 2000s. In 2007 he published his first attempt to integrate TMT through an “integral” lens, to serve as one way to up-grade what he saw as some of the weaknesses in TMT, even though he highly admires TMT. In 2020 he engaged in an in depth interview dialogue with Sheldon Solomon, one of the three core founders of TMT, and it is this Technical Paper No. 94 which offers an extensive transcript from this exchange. As well, the author includes a letter to Solomon on potential ways of upgrading TMT, especially as the world spins within the extraordinary challenges of the coronavirus epidemic and lots of death—never mind, the overall context of an Anthropocene era, which both Solomon and the author acknowledge and attempt to offer good FME.   

[i] Fisher is an Adjunct Faculty member of the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, AB, Canada. He is an educator and fearologist and co-founder of In Search of Fearlessness Project (1989- ) and Research Institute (1991- ) and lead initiator of the Fearlessness Movement ning (2015- ). The Fearology Institute was created by him recently to teach international students about fearology as a legitimate field of studies and profession. He is also founder of the Center for Spiritual Inquiry & Integral Education and is Department Head at CSIIE of Integral & 'Fear' Studies. Fisher is an independent scholar, public intellectual and pedagogue, lecturer, author, consultant, researcher, coach, artist and Principal of his own company (http://loveandfearsolutions.com). He has four leading-edge books: The World’s Fearlessness Teachings: A critical integral approach to fear management/education for the 21^st century (University Press of America/Rowman & Littlefield), Philosophy of fearism: A first East-West dialogue (Xlibris) and Fearless engagement of Four Arrows: The true story of an Indigenous-based social transformer (Peter Lang), Fear, law and criminology: Critical issues in applying the philosophy of fearism (Xlibris); India, a Nation of Fear and Prejudice (Xlibris); The Marianne Williamson Presidential Phenomenon (Peter Lang).  Currently, he is developing The Fearology Institute to teach courses. He can be reached at: r.michaelfisher52@gmail.com

Dr. Sheldon Solomon, co-founder of Terror Management Theory, dialogues with R. M. Fisher on Jeff Gibbs' new controversial film "Planet of the Humans" (2020). In FearTalk 9

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXzUhVTYdb8