Natural Glues, Cultural Glues, and the Assessment of Danger

Innately, children seem to have little true realistic anxiety.… They will run along the brink of the water, climb on to the window-sill, play with sharp objects and with fire—in short, do everything that is bound to damage them and to worry those in charge of them. When in the end realistic anxiety is awakened in them, that is wholly the result of education; for they cannot be allowed to make the instructive experiences themselves.

Initially during infancy the only stimulus situations to which a child responds with fear are the natural clues. During the second and third years other situations are added, notably presence of animals, and darkness (with its associated happenings), both of which situations, it is argued, are readily learnt derivatives of the natural clues. From his second year, in addition, a child is much influenced by observing the behaviour of significant adults and imitating it. Among the great array of behaviour a child learns in this way, all of it culturally determined, is to respond with fear to a range of stimulus situations he has hitherto treated as neutral, or even interesting. These new stimulus situations are conveniently referred to as ‘cultural clues’. In many instances, it is evident, imitative fear behaviour of this sort is entirely without insight into the nature of the danger being avoided. Because of this, fear aroused by a cultural clue has much in common with fear aroused by a natural clue. In neither case can the fear be regarded as ‘realistic’ in Freud's sense of the term.

Only very slowly and as his cognitive capacities develop does a child begin to distinguish natural or cultural clues from real danger and to learn methods of his own for calculating risk. During the same phase of growth all his behaviour is becoming organized increasingly in terms of goal-corrected plans, and