We’ve talked about how the status of the internal milieu can influence how we interpret our situation, but that leaves us with the problem of how internal milieu influences our action mechanisms more directly. It is certainly not true that we must always be interpreting our bodily state in order to produce actions. A good theory of motivation requires the observation that the body can direct the action. Emotion has to have some causal element beyond manifesting our interpretations of bodily function.

For this reason, we a need direct, biological mechanism to understand the more primal, basic emotion systems. By looking at our biology and behaviors and comparing it to other mammals, we can attempt to understand what is at the core of emotions or action-states, where situational patterns interact with action tendencies.

It is apparent that we should start with the system from which others are derived: the SEEKING system. The SEEKING system is perhaps the most multifaceted system of behavior that seems apparent in all mammals. This is the module that is the source of our wants and desires; it is what gets us to go out in the world and explore the possibilities.

What is the Seeking System?

“The SEEKING system is our general purpose appetitive-exploratory-investigatory system, that is essential for acquiring all the environmental resources needed for survival and propagation.”

Christian Montag and Jaak Panksepp in “Primary Emotional Systems and Personality”

The SEEKING system is also known as the reward system. For this system to be activated means that we experience an excitement for exploration and an expectation of reward. As Solms and Turnbull state, “On the perceptual side, it generates the feeling that something “good” will happen if we explore the environment or interact with objects. On the motor side, it promotes exploratory behaviors, like foraging.”

There are several aspects or subsystems to SEEKING. While we can desire anything pleasurable, including food, water, and comforts, we can also aim at social events that fulfill an objective. These include our sexual desire, our care for others, and our desire for play. In general, the SEEKING system is a system of wanting or searching and presents itself sometimes as curiosity and interest. Openness to experience, the personality trait is related to SEEKING.

Although the seeking system signifies something that you are lacking, it is experienced as an optimistic emotional event as long as that thing is perceived as attainable and you are moving towards it. It is key to remember this about the SEEKING system, because if the object desired is not attainable, or something is blocking its attainment, the emotion would become one of the other primal affects like RAGE or SADNESS. These emotions tend to be positive and forward looking, they give us a sense of hopeful excitement and impending rewards.

Homeostasis and Seeking Behavior

Returning to the question of the originator of emotion, we ask how does such an emotion system become evoked?

Solms and Turnbull think that what activates the SEEKING system is endogenous. That the hypothalamus takes in information about the internal milieu and puts us in the mood for maintaining the needs of the body. They call the sensors that initiate SEEKING behaviors “need detectors.” Basically, SEEKING is provoked by the recognition of a dysregulation of homeostasis, suggesting to the body that it ought to resolve this unbalanced chemistry.

What makes the SEEKING system so fundamental to other emotions is that it is caused by endogenous changes rather than interpretation or intervention of external stimuli. This means that, independent of context, we must will have the propensity to SEEK; we are an eternally curious and disruptive animal. But this does not always mean that we are SEEKING. The SEEKING system is often overrun by the others, namely FEAR, where it far is better to flee or hide than to hope for reward.

The result of the recognition of a need is not a straight forward pursual of the object as if it were naturally imprinted in the system. The object is often ambiguous, up for interpretation. The initiation of SEEKING behavior is primary to the actually seeking of an object. It is the commonality between seeking a playful social interaction and the search for food and water; it is that fundamental.

“The SEEKING system appears to be switched on in the same way by all triggers, and, when activated, it merely looks for something in a nonspecific way. All that it seems to know is that the “something” it wants is “out there.”

Solms & Turnbull in The Brain and the Inner World

An undirected SEEKING behavior may not be very advantageous from a survival standpoint. For this reason, the SEEKING system requires the accompaniment of other systems and memory of past reward.

Learning and Differentiation

SEEKING, in its base form, does not necessarily have an object. It senses a need and puts you in the SEEKING mode.

Of course, for the very clear homeostatic emotions like thirst, it may not be so ambiguous to interpret what is being sought. The reason is not because seeking liquid is a separate mechanism; it is that the SEEKING system is highly tied to such vital detectors of need. It is also highly tied to any forms of reward, whether they be social or food and drink. Thus, these behaviors are influenced by our memories of what was rewarding. The activation of SEEKING is primary to the direction in which we will take, which is based on memory and other bodily sensations and information.

It is only after learning that the becomes an object of seeking. But how do we know the object of our SEEKING?

As mentioned previously, SEEKING comes with the expectation of opportunity. That being said, other sources of information must converge and be interpreted to signify what the optimal (and possible) reward can be. Thirst is rather simple, partly because of its clear sensation in the mouth and throat, and partly because of our history of satisfaction after drinking.

But for the other objects of SEEKING, there is much more complication. Sometimes, we cannot differentiate even hunger from the need for comfort. We eat when lonely. We gather with friends if we are struggling in other pursuits. We play games to distract ourselves. What SEEKING aims at is many different things, all of which can be satisfying.

“The mode of operation of the SEEKING system is therefore incomprehensible without reference to the memory systems with which it is intimately connected.”

Solms & Turnbull in The Brain and the Inner World

The question remains how do we determine the right objects of SEEKING if it is connected almost arbitrarily with our random histories? I think this gives us great freedom in deciding what we could SEEK. There are many options and often the riskier ones (like relationships) are overlooked in place of the easier ones (like food). Rarely do we think of our desires as substitutable, and perhaps that is what can get us to build ourselves into better human beings. Almost anything can be the object of SEEKING, so it might be worth taking into account more than just the impulse of SEEKING and look further down the road.