Fight or Flight
The body's automatic response to danger — punch, run, freeze, or appease.
Origin
Coined by Harvard physiologist Walter Cannon in 1915 to describe the sympathetic-nervous-system response to threat: adrenaline floods, heart rate spikes, blood routes to muscles. Cannon's original pair was 'fight or flight.' Later researchers added 'freeze' (immobility under overwhelming threat), and Pete Walker added 'fawn' (appeasement) — giving the modern trauma vocabulary its four Fs: fight, flight, freeze, fawn. The concept is the bridge between physiology and therapy: trauma symptoms are largely a nervous system stuck in one of these modes.
Modern usage
Ordinary English. 'I went into fight-or-flight' is a normal description of any acute stress. Coaches, therapists, and corporate trainings all use the frame. The four-F expansion is mainstream in trauma-informed therapy circles but less so in casual speech.
In the wild
My boss raised his voice and I was straight into fight-or-flight.— common usage
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