TEG-Blue · Public framework
A Visual Map of Nervous-System Patterns
We do not stay the same in every situation: open and trusting one moment, guarded or controlling the next. These shifts are not random. They are state changes in the nervous system.
The body keeps reading one question: is it safe, or is there danger? Its answer lands the whole system on the active gradient, from rest and connection to protection, strategic management, and domination. Shutdown sits outside the gradient as a fallback when mobilisation cannot form.
Connection / Belonging
also known as social engagement
Safety with others — social engagement and co-regulation are available.
Safety through connection
The field is wide enough to include another person as safe and separate. Facial expression, tone, timing, context, and shared meaning can be read without defensive narrowing.
Cognitive Science — state-shaped perception (Barrett, Kahneman) + neuroception
What the gradient explains
From state shifts to relationship patterns
The Gradient is useful at the scale where people meet: one nervous system, one interaction, and the patterns that repeat between people. A state shift changes perception, tempo, emotion, empathy, and repair; when the same shifts repeat, they can become familiar relational patterns. That helps explain how distance, harm, protection, or repair form while keeping impact, accountability, and boundaries in view.
Why care is not always enough — under threat, empathy and repair can narrow even when care is present.
How rupture repeats — the same state pattern can return as distance, defensiveness, withdrawal, or pressure for certainty.
How protection turns into control — repeated self-protection can become managing, testing, pursuing, avoiding, or pushing back.
Language for shifts as they happen — recognised as state changes without turning one moment into a whole-person verdict.
A route back to connection — repair begins with the state the system is actually in, and with enough safety for impact and empathy to land.
The map
Gradient states and shutdown fallback
The Gradient runs from physiological baseline through social engagement, protection, control, and domination. Shutdown is shown as a fallback outside the line: a conservation state that changes perception, cognition, awareness, empathy, action, and repair, but does not extend the gradient itself.
- XBaseline
Safe & at rest · SAFETY · rest-and-digest · parasympathetic
Physiological baseline — restoration and broad capacity are available.
Chronic — Elevated baseline — restoration does not fully complete
- AConnection / Belonging
Safe with others · SAFETY · social engagement · parasympathetic · ventral vagal
Safety with others — social engagement and co-regulation are available.
Chronic — Connection / Belonging — safety is displayed without full access
- A↔BSafety Checking
Is it still safe? · UNCERTAINTY · parasympathetic → sympathetic
Relational uncertainty — the system checks whether safety still holds.
Chronic — Safety Checking — the safety question remains unresolved
- BProtection / Defence
Threat · THREAT · fight · flight · fawn · sympathetic
Threat — mobilisation prioritises boundary, distance, or defence.
Chronic — Protection / Defence — mobilisation stays held
- CControl / Management
Bigger threat · BIGGER THREAT · cognitive control / management · sympathetic + vagal brake
Sustained threat — cognition organises around management and control.
Chronic — Control / Management — management becomes the regulation route
- DDomination
Life threat · LIFE THREAT · power mobilisation · sympathetic
Life threat — power mobilisation overrides relational access.
Chronic — Domination — power becomes the regulation route
- ZShutdownoff-gradient
Shutdown · SHUTDOWN · freeze · collapse · parasympathetic · dorsal vagal
Overwhelm — mobilisation drops and conservation becomes primary.
Chronic — Persistent Shutdown — collapse becomes the running organisation
Research
Research areas behind the map
The public framework names the integration, then shows which research areas help illuminate specific parts of the map. Each field remains itself; TEG-Blue places the parts in relation.
The gradient / autonomic hierarchy
Polyvagal Theory — autonomic hierarchy and neuroception · Porges
State / activation
Polyvagal Theory (three states) + Stress Physiology · Porges · Sapolsky · McEwen
Perception
Cognitive Science — state-shaped perception + neuroception · Barrett · Kahneman
Cognition
Cognitive Science — cognitive load and state-shaped cognition · Bower · Kahneman · Barrett
Awareness
Interoception — internal signalling and the sense of self · A. D. Craig
Empathy
Interpersonal Neurobiology + Polyvagal social engagement · Siegel · Porges
Body / activation
Stress Physiology — acute activation → allostatic load · Sapolsky · McEwen
Time / tempo
Cognitive Science + Stress Physiology (threat compresses horizon and changes pace) · Kahneman · Sapolsky
Emotions / signals
Affective Neuroscience + Emotion Science · Panksepp · Damasio · Barrett · LeDoux
Behaviour / response
Polyvagal (mobilise / immobilise) + Trauma Research · Porges · Levine · van der Kolk
Repair
Trauma Research (completion of defence) + Attachment (co-regulation) · Levine · van der Kolk · Bowlby
Use and attribution
Authorship and use
TEG-Blue and The Nervous System Gradient were created by Anna Paretas-Artacho. Public framework content is published under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0: attribution is required, use must be non-commercial, and adaptations must be shared under the same license. View license.
Commercial, institutional, product, model, or dataset integration requires explicit permission or a separate license.
Questions
Common questions
What is TEG-Blue?
TEG-Blue is The Emotional Gradient Blueprint: a visual framework for how nervous-system state changes perception, emotions, empathy, repair, and behaviour.
What is the Nervous System Gradient?
The Nervous System Gradient is a map of the nervous system’s states. The nervous system continuously appraises one question — is it safe, or is there danger? — faster than conscious thought, and shifts the whole organism into the state that fits what it found, along an active continuum from rest, through connection and the defences, with shutdown shown as an off-gradient fallback when mobilisation cannot form.
How does the nervous system choose a state?
Through neuroception — a continuous, pre-conscious read of safety versus danger. Based on that read, the system organises itself into one of seven ordered states: X, A, A↔B, B, C, D, and Z. Each state is a complete configuration of perception, cognition, the body, feeling, and behaviour — not a mood.
What is the difference between a passing state and a chronic one?
Each position is a passing response the system is built to move through and leave (acute). When a position cannot be left, it stops being a passing response and hardens into the default (chronic). The chronic reading shows restriction, repetition and substitute routing — it describes a system that cannot leave a state, never a verdict about a person.
What research is the Nervous System Gradient grounded in?
The architecture leads; established research provides grounding for specific claims. The gradient’s autonomic hierarchy draws from Polyvagal Theory (Porges); activation and chronic load from Stress Physiology (Sapolsky, McEwen); state-shaped perception and cognition from Cognitive Science (Barrett, Kahneman); interoception from A. D. Craig; empathy from Interpersonal Neurobiology (Siegel); emotions from Affective Neuroscience (Panksepp, Damasio, LeDoux); defence and repair from Trauma Research (Levine, van der Kolk) and Attachment (Bowlby).
What are fight, flight, fawn and freeze?
They are familiar names for points on the gradient. Fight, flight and fawn are defensive expressions of Protection (mobilised self-protection under threat). Freeze and collapse are Shutdown (the system conserves when mobilisation cannot form). Rest-and-digest is Baseline; social engagement is Connection.