What is the effect of fear on performance?

[Chuck Haggard]

The problem with those stories is that too many people assume that they'll rise to the occasion in similar fashion. I suspect that far more people -- myself included -- would fall to a lower level of performance.

I know from other activities that a big adrenaline dump makes me strong and clumsy. Threat focus and loss of situational awareness are normal. Unexpected situations tend to cause brain freeze before a coherent response begins. Those can be overcome with training, but that means training with gradually increasing levels of added stress. Becoming more familiar with the threat(s) and mentally rehearsing responses can also help.

I think most people do not in fact rise to the occasion, but if one has the training and/or experience and the mindset to overcome fight-or-flight induced problems then they are vastly more likely to do so.

[GJM]

I think most people do not in fact rise to the occasion, but if one has the training and/or experience and the mindset to overcome fight-or-flight induced problems then they are vastly more likely to do so.

This sounds vaguely familiar -- might have first heard it from a man in the Arizona desert about 1991.

[NETim]

This sounds vaguely familiar -- might have first heard it from a man in the Arizona desert about 1991.

"Righteous Anger"... used to suppress and overcome fear.

Btw today marks the anniversary of his passing.

[JHC]

The problem with those stories is that too many people assume that they'll rise to the occasion in similar fashion. I suspect that far more people -- myself included -- would fall to a lower level of performance.

I know from other activities that a big adrenaline dump makes me strong and clumsy. Threat focus and loss of situational awareness are normal. Unexpected situations tend to cause brain freeze before a coherent response begins. Those can be overcome with training, but that means training with gradually increasing levels of added stress. Becoming more familiar with the threat(s) and mentally rehearsing responses can also help.

[re Cirillo's 1 vs 3 lesson] Perhaps but if you expect you couldn't possibly "rise to the occasion" I think you are far less likely too. I think this is where the mental programming of John Hearne's first post is critical.

[JHC]

GJM - Dude, you really need to make it to the Rangemaster Tactical Conference. All of (well at least most) of life's questions are answered there.

My quick take is this. Your performance in a fight will be a combination of your physical skill, your emotional control, and the particular circumstances you face. Altering either of these parts can have a dramatic effect on the outcome.

I would offer that the emotional/fear component will vary greatly by individual, up to and including genetic makeup. The key is having valid mental maps for the situation. If the situation unfolds in a manner consistent with your mental map, then your are far more likely to be able to access your physical skills and function rationally. As the incident diverges from your mental map, it become more likely that you will drop down to a more base, primal response.

To me the most important function of training is to help create valid mental maps for the situations you will likely face. Probably the strongest argument that can be made for training within YOUR context.

Your response in a fight will probably not be binary - suck or no suck, but change as the situation develops. The more it matches expectation, the better you'll do.

Vickers comments reflect a set of circumstances most likely to create emotional drops in performance. If you have a long time to anticipate contact, that will work against you. If you are fighting other fear factors - like fear of heights and falling while riding on the bench of a Little Bird, it will be harder to do well.

Other factors to consider include whether you are initiating the violence. If you are executing your plan of attack, you are clearly functioning in the rational aspects of your mind. The reason so many cops die is that they initiate the CONTACT but the bad guy starts the FIGHT. Armed citizens do well because the bad guy initiates the contact but the citizen starts the fight.

I'm pretty sure this is the best A-Z post on mindset I have ever seen. Wow.

[Chuck Haggard]

After having learned to not panic, and to embrace some of the effects of what happens under stress, I found myself in a couple of situations that were not within my experience but I stayed calm and rode things out to good effect.

One involved being partially over the rail of a bridge over the Republican River in mid winter in a multi vehicle pile-up on black ice. I can recall my thought process of what I needed to do if the car went into the river, trying to maneuver the car on the bridge, picking a spot on one of the other cars to hit to try and do the least amount of damage, etc.

Grinding down the bridge rail like I was riding a giant skateboard was an event had had never trained for, strangely enough.

[JHC]

After having learned to not panic, and to embrace some of the effects of what happens under stress, I found myself in a couple of situations that were not within my experience but I stayed calm and rode things out to good effect.

One involved being partially over the rail of a bridge over the Republican River in mid winter in a multi vehicle pile-up on black ice. I can recall my thought process of what I needed to do if the car went into the river.

+1 I believe one can improvise the hell out of a situation very effectively.

[NETim]

Um... today is the 24th. Cooper passed on 9/25/2006. Pay no attention to that guy's post above. (He'd edit if he could.)

[Odin Bravo One]

My first question is do we have anything more than anecdotal, that has tried to quantify the effect of "fear" on performance?

My third question is what is the effect of adrenalin and other physiological reactions to stress and danger, and do these bodily reactions enhance or hinder performance?

Q1- If we are to keep the subject relative to the overall topic of shooting for all the marbles, how would one quantify the effect of fear? Unlike ballistics where there are measurable categories and data, there is nothing relating to fear that can be measured, weighed, evaluated, or otherwise recorded, studied, and/or assessed in a life/death encounter. Due to the subjective nature, the only thing you will have is anectodal references and stories, which are also known as AAR's in some circles, and carry much more weight and credibility to some than all of the lab tests in the world. Properly done, and kept in proper perspective, AAR's have much more benefit than most people in the shooting/gun/training world give them credit for. Granted........most people have also never seen a properly prepared and discussed AAR either.

Q3- The effects will vary as greatly as the circumstances. Everyone is different, as are the effects, and how they will impact a given person in a given set of circumstances is extremely unpredictable for the majority of people who do not address this subject on a regular basis during training. But again, there is no way to measure or compare results, so it becomes a discussion point without an endstate.

The discussion on such a topic is not likely to be a means to an end. At the end of such a discussion, I don't think there will be any more quanitfiable, verifiable, or tangible answers than there were prior to the topic being brought up. However, there is likely to be many opportunities for learning to occur throughout the dialogue, and the discussion itself is where learning will take place, and not necessarily upon conclusion.

Hopefully people find something useful out of it before it goes beyond the 5 page limit.

[John Hearne]

Improvisation under life and death stress is absolutely possible. I think that Mirales figuring out how to run his 870 one-handed during the Miami firefight, is my favorite example. However, we don't see it much, especially in unskilled combatants.