How Soldiers Keep Cool Under Fire

Many battles throughout history have been waged against all possible odds by armless and unprepared men, who in the end managed to vanquish their opposition and win the confrontation. In several of these cases, people have always wondered how is it that some soldiers or warriors are so cool under pressure that they can navigate a whole battlefield, seemingly oblivious to the sounds that would make regular folks go insane. Now, a scientific study sheds light on exactly what goes on during fighting.

At the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), held in Chicago, researcher Deane Aikins, from the Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, told reporters that everything about keeping or not keeping you cool when under fire was related to hormones. Out of the tens of types of hormones we have, only a few work regularly, inhibiting or promoting various processes inside our human body.

In some individuals, the level of hormonal expression is much higher than in others. “There are certain individuals who just don't get as stressed. Their stress hormones are actually lower. All of the recovery hormone systems, all of the systems that turn it down, really kick in for these resilient individuals,” Aikins says. He and his team have managed to determine that the cortisol stress hormone is directly responsible for the way soldiers behave in the heat of the battle. When too higher levels exist, fear and stress set in, gravely diminishing a fighter's skills.

Conversely, when little cortisol is in the blood, but when the production of the neuropeptide y anti-stress hormone is increased, soldiers exhibit far more control over their actions and their minds, which allows them to successfully negotiate difficult situations, no matter how difficult. “The question is how do you get folks who aren't as cool in stress trained up?” Aikins asks.

The team at Yale is currently working on finding viable ways of adapting those who do not fare well under stress to the rigor of the battlefield, so that their performance would be increased. The scientists are contemplating using small amounts of neuropeptide y in order to boost a fighter's confidence and dampen his or her response to stress.