{"id":223493,"date":"2025-10-16T03:32:56","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T08:32:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/10\/jump-scare-science-study-elucidates-how-the-brain-responds-to-fear"},"modified":"2025-10-16T03:32:56","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T08:32:56","slug":"jump-scare-science-study-elucidates-how-the-brain-responds-to-fear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/10\/jump-scare-science-study-elucidates-how-the-brain-responds-to-fear","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Jump-scare\u2019 science: Study elucidates how the brain responds to fear"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/jump-scare-science-study-elucidates-how-the-brain-responds-to-fear3.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In haunted houses across the country this month, threatening figures will jump out of the shadows, prompting visitors\u2014wide-eyed and heart racing\u2014to instinctively freeze and flee.<\/p>\n<p>Evolutionarily speaking, this \u201cinnate <a href=\"https:\/\/medicalxpress.com\/tags\/threat\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">threat<\/a> response\u201d is key to survival, helping a wide variety of animal species escape predators. But when stuck in overdrive it can cause problems for humans.<\/p>\n<p>A University of Colorado Boulder research team has identified a novel brain circuit responsible for orchestrating this threat response. Known as the interpeduncular nucleus (IPN), this dense cluster of specialized neurons not only jump-starts that freeze-and-flee reaction, but dials it down when animals learn there\u2019s no real danger.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In haunted houses across the country this month, threatening figures will jump out of the shadows, prompting visitors\u2014wide-eyed and heart racing\u2014to instinctively freeze and flee. Evolutionarily speaking, this \u201cinnate threat response\u201d is key to survival, helping a wide variety of animal species escape predators. But when stuck in overdrive it can cause problems for humans. [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,224],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-223493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-neuroscience","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223493"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223493\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}