The open field test (OFT) is widely used to score anxiety and depression levels in rodents. In the OFT, fruit flies show wall-following behavior (WAFO) similar to rodents. However, it is questionable to which extent insects can perceive emotions such as fear or depression. To characterise the influence of emotion-like states on the OFT behavior in flies, we measured both WAFO and total walking (TOWA) in the OFT in wild-type flies paired with negative or positive stimuli, altered internal states, or pharmaceutical treatment.CantonS wildtype flies treated with negatively valenced biological stressors including social isolation, starvation, sex deprivation, and sleep deprivation showed an increase in WAFO and TOWA. This increase was reversed after removal of the stressor. Similarly, WAFO and TOWA increased in CantonS flies after aversive physical treatments including heat, mechanical shake, and electric foot shock (EFS). Interestingly, after consecutive EFS (CEFS), only WAFO but not TOWA increased. Positive pharmacological treatment with 5mM diazepam decreased both WAFO and TOWA. Similarly, overexpression of the serotonin transporter and activation of reward neurons (dopaminergic PAM neurons, NPF neurons) decreased WAFO. In line, inhibition of PAM neurons increased WAFO.In summary, our data suggests that OFT analysis reports emotion-primitives in flies which can be surprisingly well described by the circumplex model of affect. This widely accepted model in psychology classifies human emotions by two bipolars (valence and arousal). The results now allow us to study the role of neuromodulators and intracellular signaling pathways on emotion-like states in Drosophila using neutral terminology.