12/5/2023 0 Comments Mental duress![]() ![]() These environments are sought out by certain types of people, such as explorers and adventurers, submariners, divers working under sea (who may also be isolated for extended periods in hyperbaric saturation chambers), astronauts involved in space missions and working in space stations, and even certain religious sects whose practice involves withdrawal from interactions with the outside world even to the pursuit of a solitary life. Some environments or situations can be considered as ‘exceptional’ in that, whilst we have not naturally adapted to these environments, coping behaviours can be learned to enable us to exist within them. Nonetheless, any person can be considered an active agent, capable of adapting and coping, not only in normal environments but also in exceptional, extreme and even torturous environments. We have adapted to operate within an optimal environment that means both an interaction with that environment through goal-directed behaviour, and possessing some control and choice over that environment however, the more the environment deviates from the optimal the less control we have and the more reactive we become to it. Our cognitive system is mostly reliable, robust and flexible in interacting with different environments and its underpinning of our behaviour has been key in enabling the human species to inhabit every type of terrain on the planet. Human beings are highly resistant and adaptable to the most varied environmental conditions. The individual experience of extremis can be pathogenic or salutogenic and attempts are being made to capitalise on these positive experiences whilst ameliorating the more negative aspects of living in an abnormal environment. Each single factor may not be considered tortuous, however, if deliberately structured into a systemic cluster may constitute torture under legal definition. The main factors in an abnormal environment are: psychological (isolation, sensory deprivation, sensory overload, sleep deprivation, temporal disorientation) psychophysiological (thermal, stress positions), and psychosocial (cultural humiliation, sexual degradation). or ‘tortuous’, when specific environmental stimuli are used deliberately against a person in an attempt to undermine his will or resistance. ‘extreme’, marked by more intense environmental stimuli and a real or perceived lack of control over the situation, e.g., surviving at sea in a life-raft, harsh prison camp etc. These abnormal environments can be ‘exceptional’, e.g., polar base, space station, submarine, prison, intensive care unit, isolation ward etc. An abnormal environment is one to which we are not optimally adapted but can accommodate through the development of coping strategies. Our cognitive system has adapted to support goal-directed behaviour within a normal environment. ![]()
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