Human Brains Are Primally Wired To Notice Animals

Surrounded by technology and urbanity we may be, but the human brain remains profoundly hard-wired for responding to animals. When people are shown pictures of animals, specific parts of their amygdalas - a structure central to pleasure and pain, fear and reward - react almost instantly.

Put another way, glimpsing a bird at the feeder or a shark on Animal Planet could invoke cognitive tricks inherited from ancestors who walked on four legs in shallow water.