Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage - an Account of Recent Researches into the Function of Emotional Excitement (1927)

BODILY CHANGES IN PAIN, HUNGER, FEAR AND RAGE- AN ACCOUNT OF RECENT RE SEARCHES INTO THE FUNCTION OF EMOTIONAL EXCITEMENT by WALTER B. CANNON. Originally published in 1927. PREFACE: Fear, rage and pain, and the pangs of hunger are all primitive experiences which human beings share with the lower animals. These experiences are properly classed as among the most powerful that determine the action of men and beasts. A knowledge of the conditions which attend these experiences, therefore, is of general and fundamental importance in the interpretation of behavior. During the past four years there has been conducted, in the Harvard Physiological Laboratory, a series of in vestigations concerned with the bodily changes which occur in conjunction with pain, hunger and the major emotions. A group of remarkable alterations in the bodily economy have been discovered, all of which can reasonably be regarded as responses that are nicely adapted to the individual's welfare and preservation. Because