Development of Phobias Phobias have been in existence for many years. As humans we fear things that are life threatening and unnatural. Someone who has an irrational fear of something is considered a phobia, which is an extreme illogical fear or dislike of something. Fear is a very common emotion which distinguishes from phobia regarding the severe distress someone with a phobia goes through. Fear is a rationalized and instinctive emotion that comes in response to a threatening situation. The reaction caused by fear can be managed. Phobias can hinder someone’s life. People who struggle with phobias constantly avoid the object of fear, and will do anything required not to see it. It’s hard to directly to clearly figure out the cause regarding …show more content…
This has been going on from the start of humanity. Fear comes from within the conscious and that is inevitable; there are many things that are frightening to us humans. A lot of these fears are learned through experiences growing up. I’ve always wondered what happened to someone to have such a strong irrational fear. The number of phobias are highly increasing, 2017 has been recorded as the highest amount of phobias diagnosis(Phobias 1). We teach ourselves these things without even realizing it, until we have already encrypted the phobia into our minds. There are many studies today trying to understand the development of these phobias. Having phobias can have a massive interruption of daily routines, limit productiveness, create low self-esteem, and place a strain on relationships with families or friends because people will avoid the …show more content…
For example, the fear of dentists can leave people suffering from it willing to risk the health of their teeth in order to avoid having to go through an exam or procedure (MacKay 2). There are a variety of treatments ranging from psychotherapy to even medication. Phobias are treatable conditions that can be reduced and even terminated. Symptoms of phobias vary from mild feelings of anxiety to full panic attacks. The closer the person with the phobia gets to their feared object, the greater the fear will be (Cause of phobias 2). This puts in perspective the mindset of someone who struggles with a phobia goes
Conquering phobias is a specialty of hypnotherapists. A phobia is a compulsive fear of a specified situation or object (Knight 2). A few types of phobias are fear of open spaces, fear of snow, fear of the cold, fear of marriage, fear of insanity, fear of being alone, fear of darkness, fear of disease, fear of beards, fear of birds, fear of being stared at, fear of bein...
There’s a monster under your bed, and there are ghosts in the attic. The Bogey man is in your closet and ravens await your death so they can pick from your rotting flesh. Flowers are ready to strangle you, as pickles prepare to choke you in the night. It’s almost funny to hear of people who actually fear flowers and pickles. But these people have real legit fears of even the nicest of things. Although these fears are horrible, and should not be feared; I think the more we know about them, the more we can be prepared. There must be a deeper meaning of these weird phobias. Is it nature? Or inherited traits of the human body? Maybe they come from past experiences? Even as these fears are quite interesting, but unwanted, I want to know why people acquire these ridiculous fears and how we could stop them.
Almost everyone alive has a fear of something whether it be heights, spiders or even clowns. Some people however have more serious issues with their fears, fears that follow them almost everywhere they go, these fears are called phobias. It is estimated that 4 to 5 percent of Americans have some type of phobia, which is an irrational fear of situations and certain objects. There are over 500 known phobias; a very common phobia is social phobia.
Fear. A simple four-lettered word that describes a powerful emotion that takes over and changes us in an instant. When I was younger, I remember that the consequences of being disciplined frightened me so much that I would do anything in my power to stay out of trouble; as I heard my parents yell out my name while I was conscious that did something wrong, I would lie about the events so my parents would be as merciful as possible. Certainly, this situation has occurred to numerous children across the world. Furthermore, the fear inflicted over me as a child led me to abandon my moral judgement in order to escape harsh punishment. However, what happens when human beings use this fear is used as a way to control others? Throughout history, “fear
... that he may have read online. This nearly resulted in his death. This phobia proves to be the worst phobia that doctors face, when trying to convince a patient that everything on the internet is not necessarily true, and that the patients should come to them for better advice. An individual who is severely affected by a phobia would have an increase in heart rate, which could lead to a variety of other ailments, such as, fainting, seizures, nausea and even sweating. For those who have the fear of any sort of medical treatment in an extreme manor, there are specific coping treatments that could be taken. Psychological treatments are the treatment of choice, especially when dealing with this type of fear for medical procedure. One such treatment is, Exposure based treatment for instance – the exposure of the patient to the feared object without any necessary danger.
...6. Generalization from the original phobic stimulus to stimuli of a similar nature will occur; 7. Noxious experiences which occur under conditions of excessive confinement are more likely to produce phobic reactions; 8. Neutral stimuli which are associated with a noxious experience, may develop motivating properties. This acquired drive is termed the fear drive; 9. Responses (such as avoidance) which reduce the fear drive are reinforced; 10. Phobic reactions can be acquired vicariously (Rachman 31). These theories are used to identify how people obtain phobias and other situations that may occur with phobias.
Phobias have been in existence for many years. Phobias date back to the works of Hippocrates, a prehistoric Greek physician (Korgeski, 2009). The works of Hippocrates are still debated today. In The Seventh Book of Epidemics, one of the publications by Hippocrates, he studied an individual and he interpreted a condition that the person portrayed. The results of the observation were that the individual was petrified of the sound of a flute, if he wasn’t intoxicated. He noticed the individual was fine during the day listening to the flute but during the night hours everything was different (Korgeski, 2009). From this observation and the work of Hippocrates helped contribute to the creation of term phobia. The word phobia was formulated from a Greek god. Phobus, the son of Ares, means panic and fear (Atsma, 2000). The term phobia was used to describe psychological problems and it was used discreetly in the 1800s.
In the words of Bertrand Russell, “Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom” (Russell). Fear causes many problems in our lives. Fear influences many of a person’s actions and decisions. However, people usually regret the decisions or actions they made out of fear. Also, these actions and decisions can cause problems for those people in their future. Fear is a harmful emotion, for it clouds people’s judgement, disables them from taking action, and causes them to make decisions that they will regret later.
A phobia is a persistent and intense fear — and may be considered irrational – of an object, situation, place, animal or activity. Phobias are diagnosed when it starts to interfere with an Individual’s ability to work, socialise and go about their daily routine. Those whom have a phobia will normally have their anxiety levels strikingly high and in response their feared stimulus will cause significant distress and impair their normal functioning. It is listed in the fifth edition of the ‘Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5)’ under anxiety disorders. However, it is stated by many doctors such as ‘Dr. Christopher L. Heffner’ that phobias are highly treatable and will have the highest likelihood of recovery compared to other psychological
A phobia is an irrational fear that isn’t like a general anxiety disorder because it is usually connected to something specific. About ninety percent of children and ten percent of adults have Nyctophobia. Nyctophobia usually generate from a traumatic experience from one’s past. For example, being left in the dark as a punishment or joke as a child to scare them, possibly making siblings and friends responsible for creating the fear. The film industry and
In order to treat the fear you must treat it with relaxation while in the presence of the feared situation. The first step in Wolpe’s study was to focus on relaxing your body. He recommended a process that involves tensing and relaxing various groups of muscles until a deep state of relaxation is achieved (Wolpe,264). The second stage was to develop a list of anxiety-producing situations that are associated with the phobia. The list would descend with from the least uncomfortable situation to the most anxiety producing event you can imagine. The number of events can vary from 5 to 20 or more. The final step is to desensitize, which is the actual “unlearning” of the phobia. Wolpe told his patients that no actual contact with the fear is necessary, and that the same effectiveness can be accomplished through descriptions and visualizations(Wolpe,265). Wolpe’s participants are told to put themselves in a state of relaxation which they are taught. Then, the therapist begins reading the first situation on the hierarchy they have made up. If the patient stays relaxed through the first situation the therapist continues to the next until the state of relaxation is broken. If they feel a slight moment of anxiety they are to raise their index finger until the state of relaxation is restored. The average number
This paper is focused on how fear as a subject is being perceived by many as a dominant and primitive human emotion. An uncontrollable energy that’s exists and created within every individual, which is directed towards an object or a given situation that does not present an actual danger. The individual then analyzes that the fear is contradictory and thus cannot help the reaction. Gradually, the phobia aims to build up and aggravate as the fear of fear response takes hold. Eventually they distinguish their fear responses as negative, and go out of their way to avoid those reactions. ‘Fear is derived as a basic feeling and therefore created by us – it is not something we have, but something we do. The principle of fear is to keep us safe.’
Phobias are described as "a persistent, irrational fear of an object, activity or situation that compels a person to avoid it, and causes distress and function impairment" (Yahoo! Health, 2002). For example, a normal person who is afraid of high places and has a friend that lives on the top floor of a tall building would probably not stop visiting that friend. On the other hand, a person with acrophobia (fear of heights) would. By definition, a phobia is irrational. If a fear prevents a person from enjoying life or it preoccupies thoughts in a way that the person is unable to work, sleep or function as they would like to, the fear becomes irrational and is termed a phobia. The many phobic people who think their fears are silly, childish, or trivial often try to conceal them. While hiding from their fears they hide their phobias from others, further limiting their experience of life. Although "normal" anxiety is adaptive- that is, it helps you to survive and be productive- too much anxiety can be crippling. People who suffer from certain patterns of signs and symptoms related to anxiety are considered by me...
Nyctophobia, also known as the extreme or irrational fear of the dark, is a phobia that presents the prevalent fear present in children of all ages. For most this irrational fear goes away with age, but for some it persists into adolescents and even into adulthood. A phobia is a persistent, often unreasonable, fear of an object, event, or situation. People who have phobias become afraid if they even think about the object or event they fear. They usually remain calm and comfortable when they avoid that object or any thoughts about it. There are certain phobias that are categorized as specific phobias, these are those in which a persistent fear of a specific object or situation occur (Comer, 2015). People experiencing these specific phobias usually experience immediate fear when around or thinking of the object or event they fear. The impact these phobias have on a person’s life depends largely on what activated the fear (Comer, 2015). With nyctophobia, the impact is often quite large because there are many different incidences where one may have to encounter the dark. This often leads to individuals avoiding activities that occur in the dark or during the night leading to impaired social development, especially in children.
Phobias are irrational fear to a person, place or object and they are classified as an anxiety disorder. There is a term for every phobia imaginable. Phobias affect approximately nineteen million individuals, with the fears ranging from blood to women and every thing in between. The symptoms one experiences when suffering with a phobia include profuse sweating, headaches, extreme nausea and a variety of other physical symptoms.