Many people claim to be afraid of spiders, but probably not to the degree of 37-year-old "Mary Muffet" of Seattle. Mary went to many lengths to be spider-free, including sealing her windows and doors with duct tape, spraying her car with bug killer, and putting every single piece of washed and ironed clothing into its own sealed plastic bag. She wasn't just afraid of spiders; she had arachnophobia, a phobia, not to be confused with a simple fear. Phobias are not simple; they are complex in both their origin and diagnosis, with many types that people suffer from and any number of treatments exist to date. What is a phobia? 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... ... middle of paper ... ...Deepest fears may be blast from our evolutionary past. The Dallas Morning News. p. 7D. Sisson, B. (1998, June 24). Virtual reality for real-life fears. The Vancouver Columbian. Social Phobia/Social Anxiety Association. (2002). Fact sheet. Retrieved November 11, 2002, from the World Wide Web: http://www.socialphobia.org/fact.html Tevlin, J. (1999, November 21). Cabin pressure-the sky is the limit for millions of Americans who are afraid to fly. But a Northwest Airlines program helps people tame their terror. The Minneapolis Star Tribune: Newspaper of the Twin-Cities. p. 1E. Yahoo! Health. (2000). Phobia-simple/specific. Retrieved November 11, 2002, from the World Wide Web: http://health.yahoo.com/health/encyclopedia/000956/_0.html
One of the characteristics of a phobia is a feeling that is greater than the fear of a situation or object with an exaggeration of the danger associated with the said situation or even object. This persistent fear often leads to an anxiety disorder that leads an individual to develop mechanisms that ensure one avoids the object or situation that triggers the occurrence of the phobia. Phobias can have highly debilitating effects on an individual including the development of depression, isolation, substance abuse, and even suicide. Many people take phobia for granted however, it is clear that it has the potential to impair the quality of life for both the affected and the people around them. The fact that many of the phobias are manageable using
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.
Imagine you are sitting on your porch, and suddenly something starts moving in the grass, heading your direction. You lean forward out of curiosity. Then you see it, it stops; it appears to be staring at you. It is a disgusting, slimy-looking creature with fangs that is about to jump at you. Yes, it is a snake! You quietly sidle to the side, so it does not attack for you are afraid of its deadly venom. The feeling of faintness and dizziness overcomes you, which is a sign of anxiety. Moreover, you cry and scream hysterically after moving away from it. If you have experienced something similar, you may have a case of Ophidiophobia, the phobia or abnormal fear of snakes. Not to worry, there are cures for this phobia.
Phobias are not life threatening or an illness, but it does impact one’s life. Some people do not go into town or to the park because they are afraid of dogs. This is an example of how phobias can limit one’s life. Phobias are not an illness, but they are not healthy. They can cause one’s heart to race and can cause extreme panic. For example, people who are epileptic and have a phobia need medicine to control the panic or else they can go into a seizure or pass out. The most successful treatment is exposure therapy. This treatment usually involves a therapist to help the patient. In this treatment the therapist exposes the patient to their fear until the patient realizes how irrational the fear is and becomes emotionless toward the stimuli causing the
Phobias are immense and unreasonable fears of certain situations or objects. Phobias endure for long periods of time. Phobias cause intense physical and psychological reactions, and can affect things that people do in their everyday lives. A phobia is a type of anxiety disorder, since anxiety is the main symptom experienced by the sufferer. Phobias can form from many different things. According to the Mayo Clinic(2017) Phobias come from negative experiences, genetic and environmental and factors as well as brain function. Numerous phobias are triggered by having a negative experience or panic attack identified with a particular question or circumstance. For genetic and environmental factors, one can learn what to be afraid of by simply seeing
In adults, social fear is a very common issue because millions of adults worldwide suffer from it and it has often turned out to be a traumatic and devastating condition that they face each day. The fear may come from a particular social fear or a general social fear. For instance, epidemiological studies carried out by the United States recently ranked social fear as the third biggest psychological disorder within the region; it comes right after depression and alcoholism. Furthermore, an estimated 7 percent of this population currently experiences some kind of social fear. Moreover, the rate of lifetime prevalence for the growing social fear disorder ranges from 13 to 14 percent. Hence, it is important to study the concept in order to understand the characteristics and symptoms that contribute
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 not only affect people’s lives personally and socially but it also affects them physically and mentally. Phobias can
The researchers had a very extensive method in order to get the best results for their experiment. First, they collected 19 participants from the University of Kaiserslautern. Then, the participants were asked to described themselves as highly fearful of spiders or not. From ...
There are three kinds of phobias: simple phobia, social phobia, and panic attacks. Simple phobias, also called specific phobias, are fears of a specific thing, such as spiders or being in a closed place. Most simple phobias develop during childhood and eventually disappear. Specific phobia is a marked fear of a specific object or situation. It is a category for any phobias other than agoraphobia and social phobia. The categories of specific phobias are 1. situational phobias such as: fear of elevators, airplanes, enclosed places, public transportation, tunnels, or bridges; 2. fear of the natural environment such as: storms, water, or heights; 3. animal phobias such as: fear of dogs, snakes, insects, or mice; 4. blood-injection-injury phobia such as: fear of seeing blood or an injury, or of receiving an injection. (Wood 520).
Attention Getter: According to the article “Phobia Statistics” from fearof.net, “Nearly 15-20% of us experience specific phobias at least once in our life. In the U.S., nearly 8.7% of people (aged 18 and over) have at least one extreme specific fear and nearly 25 million Americans report having the fear of flying phobia.
What was the sound beyond the hallway, or that figure on the corner of your eye? That certain sensation of your heart beat getting louder and your palms sweating,the chill called fear. Fear is a defense system to warn humans we could be in danger, but what if fear goes too far? People with phobias feel a cold sweat drop from their faces, their pupils dilated,shaking at the sight of stop-lights or does not have the heart to cross rivers, it is most likely a phobia. It is an irrational fear that takes over someone's mind and prevents them to surmount obstacles in their life. They can range from something as scary as spiders to something as strange as paper-towel rolls. Like Lea Winerman, a writer for American Psychology Association, states, “ All phobias are anxiety disorders, lumped in the same class as post-traumatic stress disorder and panic disorder, among others. And anxiety disorders are, fundamentally, based on fear.” Phobias prevents people from functioning normally and have a healthy life by taking hold of their lives and daily schedules. The effects of having a phobia results in inconveniences in your life, stress, and medical problems in your future.
We all have our fears, rather it be flying or driving. However, when a phobia is present the individual has extreme irrational fears that interfere with their quality of life. For example a fear of heights may limit an individuals living or employment choices. If this individual is offered the job of a lifetime, however, the office is located on the twentieth floor; they will refuse the job due to the fear of heights.
What are you afraid of? Are you afraid of spiders, heights, or snakes? Most of the fears people have are completely normal. Many people feel the same way. But, in some cases, the fear that people have is so intense, it is considered a phobia. About 19 million Americans have a phobia that interfere negatively in their lives. Fear is a feeling induced by perceived danger or threat. But, phobias are much more. “A phobia is a type of anxiety disorder that causes an individual to experience extreme, irrational fear about a situation, living creature, place, or object.” People who have a phobia intentionally avoid what they consider to be dangerous or fearful. They may experience a deep sense of dread or panic when they encounter their source of