Objectives

The potential differences between phylogenetic threats (e.g., snakes) and ontogenetic threats (e.g., guns) can have a wide-ranging impact on a variety of theoretical and practical issues, from etiology of specific phobias to stimulus selection in psychophysiological studies, yet this line of research has not been systematically reviewed.

Methods

We summarize and synthesize findings from fear conditioning, illusory correlation, attention bias, and neuroimaging studies that have compared these two types of threats to human survival.

Results

While a few brain imaging studies reveal preliminary evidence for different brain networks involved in the processing of phylogenetic and ontogenetic threats, attention bias studies tentatively show faster reaction time for modern threats, illusory correlation bias is evident for both types of threats, and fear conditioning studies are far from conclusive.

Conclusions

The results of behavioral experiments, especially attention bias research, pose a challenge to established theories like biological preparedness and fear module, as they show faster reaction time to modern threats, which is the opposite of what some evolutionary theories predict. We discuss the findings in terms of other theories that might explain the same results and conclude with potential future directions.

中文翻译：

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蛇与枪：系统发育和个体发育威胁比较的系统回顾

目标

系统发育威胁（例如，蛇）和个体发育威胁（例如，枪支）之间的潜在差异可以对各种理论和实践问题产生广泛的影响，从特定恐惧症的病因到心理生理学研究中的刺激选择，但这条线的研究尚未系统地审查。

方法

我们总结并综合了恐惧条件反射、错觉相关性、注意力偏差和神经影像学研究的结果，这些研究比较了这两种对人类生存的威胁。

结果

虽然一些脑成像研究揭示了参与系统发育和个体发育威胁处理的不同大脑网络的初步证据，但注意力偏差研究暂时显示对现代威胁的反应时间更快，两种类型的威胁和恐惧条件研究都存在明显的虚幻相关偏差远非定论。

结论

行为实验的结果，尤其是注意力偏差研究，对生物准备和恐惧模块等既定理论提出了挑战，因为它们对现代威胁的反应时间更快，这与一些进化理论预测的相反。我们根据可能解释相同结果的其他理论讨论这些发现，并得出未来潜在方向的结论。