In psychology

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

, harm avoidance (HA) is a personality trait characterized by excessive worrying; pessimism; shyness; and being fearful, doubtful, and easily fatigued. In MRI studies HA was correlated with reduced grey matter volume in the orbito-frontal, occipital and parietal regions.

Harm avoidance is a temperament assessed in the Temperament and Character Inventory

Temperament and Character Inventory

Temperament and Character Inventory is an inventory for personality traits devised by Cloninger et al.It is closely related to and an outgrowth of Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire ,...

 (TCI), its revised version (TCI-R) and the Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire

Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire

Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire is a personality test.It was devised by C. Robert Cloninger.A newer version of the questionnaire is called Temperament and Character Inventory....

 (TPQ) and is somewhat related to the trait "neuroticism

Neuroticism

Neuroticism is a fundamental personality trait in the study of psychology. It is an enduring tendency to experience negative emotional states. Individuals who score high on neuroticism are more likely than the average to experience such feelings as anxiety, anger, guilt, and depressed mood...

" in the Revised NEO Personality Inventory

Revised NEO Personality Inventory

The Revised NEO Personality Inventory, or NEO PI-R, is a psychological personality inventory; a 240-item measure of the Five Factor Model: Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Openness to Experience. Additionally, the test measures six subordinate dimensions of each of...

 and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire

Eysenck Personality Questionnaire

In psychology, Eysenck Personality Questionnaire is a questionnaire to assess the personality traits of a person.It was devised by the psychologists Hans Jürgen Eysenck and his wife Sybil B. G. Eysenck....

, — all regarded as anxiety

Anxiety

Anxiety is a psychological and physiological state characterized by somatic, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral components. The root meaning of the word anxiety is 'to vex or trouble'; in either presence or absence of psychological stress, anxiety can create feelings of fear, worry, uneasiness,...

-related traits.

The HA of TPQ and TCI-R has four subscales:

1. Anticipatory worry (HA1)
2. Fear of uncertainty (HA2)
3. Shyness/Shyness with strangers (HA3)
4. Fatigability/Fatigability and asthenia (HA4)

It has been suggested that HA is related to high serotonergic

Serotonin

Serotonin or 5-hydroxytryptamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter. Biochemically derived from tryptophan, serotonin is primarily found in the gastrointestinal tract, platelets, and in the central nervous system of animals including humans...

 activity,
and much research has gone into investigating the link between HA and components of the serotonin system, e.g., genetic variation in 5-HTTLPR

5-HTTLPR

5-HTTLPR is a degenerate repeat polymorphic region in SLC6A4, the gene that codes for the serotonin transporter.Since the polymorphism was identified in the middle of the 1990s,...

 in the serotonin transporter

Serotonin transporter

The serotonin transporter is a monoamine transporter protein.This protein is an integral membrane protein that transports the neurotransmitter serotonin from synaptic spaces into presynaptic neurons. This transport of serotonin by the SERT protein terminates the action of serotonin and recycles it...

gene.