Public Speaking Phobia
“On October 7, 1973, the London Sunday Times reported that the largest number of Americans, 41% of those surveyed by a team of market researchers listed speaking before a group as their greatest fear,” (Dwyer, K., & Davidson, M. M. 2012).
While studying different types of phobia’s that humans may have, there are several phobias that develop over a period of time, due to unknowns or fears of things because of something that may of happened in that individuals life. Phobia is basically a fear of something that an individual may have because of past experiences or even the unknown. Most children have fears of the dark because of the unknown in the dark, where as adults have many different fears, like flying in an airplane because of the prudential fear of death. As a teacher in a high school we had a coach who had two German Sheppard dogs, when he brought them to school one day to show the students, several of the students ran and even jumped over the tables to get away from the dogs in fear of getting bitten, even though the dogs showed no signs of aggression. This paper will focus on another type of phobia and that is the phobia of public speaking. The fear an individual has to stand in front of people and talk about a subject with confidence.
For some individuals, when observing them given a lecture or just talking in public, they seem to have a free will of talking to people without any problem. This author’s father was one of those type individuals. It seemed that he knew everyone in the world; he was able to talk with any individual who just walked up. For those individuals who cannot seem to have a talkative personality, we usually call them shay or not very sociable. According to the British Journal ...
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...or overcome it. To overcome the fair of public speaking, the speaker must talk in public.
Works Cited
Botella, C. C., Gallego, M. J., Garcia-Palacios, A. A., Baños, R. M., Quero, S. S., & Alcaniz, M. M. (2009). The Acceptability of an Internet-based self-help treatment for fear of public speaking. British Journal Of Guidance & Counselling, 37(3), 297-311. doi:10.1080/03069880902957023
Dwyer, K., & Davidson, M. M. (2012). Is Public Speaking Really More Feared Than Death? Communication Research Reports, 29(2), 99. doi:10.1080/08824096.2012.667772
Environmental Graffiti, http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/news-bizarre-phobiasal
Helmus, T. C., Tancer, M., & Johanson, C. (2005). Reinforcing effects of diazepam under anxiogenic conditions in individuals with social anxiety. Experimental And Clinical Psychopharmacology, 13(4), 348-356. doi:10.1037/1064-1297.13.4.348
In Coercion, Douglas Rushkoff explains how easily people are easily coerced. For example, Rushkoff states that people are convinced by car salesman to pay more for a car than they wanted to. In Julius Caesar, Marc Antony asks to speak at the funeral of his dear friend, Julius Caesar, after one of the murderers, Brutus, speaks. Brutus convinces the Romans that Caesar would be a tyrant if he did not murder him, while Antony convinces the Romans that Caesar is not ambitious and there would never be another ruler like Caesar. The art of public speaking is important in the past and present.
Conveying a message through the use of public speaking goes far beyond the words you say. When presenting a speech, there is much that goes into it, and more to truly get your message into the minds of the listeners. Every great speech consists of several key elements that are used to support and back up the words that are spoken. In 2011, Pamela Meyer presented her speech, “How to Spot a Liar,” as a TED Talks. In the speech, she uses many of these public speaking techniques when she discusses the key ideas she addresses in her novel: Liespotting: Proven Techniques to Detect Deception. Her speech is informative, consisting of information on how to spot someone who is lying, as well as mindboggling statistics concerning the omnipresence of lying in today’s society. In Meyer’s speech, she uses specific
The speech delivered by Dr. Randy Pausch is a powerful and influential public speaking, including various communication components that we should pay attention to and learn when we present our speeches. This lecture is divided into three parts: My childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others and lessons learned. Dr. Randy Pausch told his audience what he believed and valued with his proper body languages, effective and efficient delivery and interesting and attractive visual aids. From this speech, it can be told that the speaker’s strengths and effectiveness from the lecture, which can reflect my problems as a communicator and a public speaker
Many of us had a stage in their lives when they were shy. Some will always be like this. While it might be considered as disadvantage, it's common and not surprising. But what if we're so embarrassed around other people that we start to avoid them, being in public makes us nauseous, and we have tremendous difficulty with even buying food in stone? What's more, it makes us feel worthless and totally destroys our social life... It's not a simple shyness anymore, even if many people would classify it as such. This problem, still not known very well, is called Social Anxiety Disorder. Hippocrates was apparently first human to notice symptoms of social anxiety, which was named social phobia for the first time in around 1900. It wasn't really known until 1985, when psychiatrist Michael Liebowitz and clinical psychologist Richard Heimberg done a research on this topic and made it more widely recognized. Moreover, it's actually world's third biggest mental problem - as The Kim Foundation claims, there are about 40 million people around 18 years old having this disorder. Psychologists researching causes of this phenomena. I am writing about social anxiety disorder, because I am trying to show you how it can change someone and why it's extremely difficult to live with it in order to explain how we can understand person suffering it, help him or her or recognize this disorder, so that we will know more about human psychology.
Few people are fearless speakers. As students, we generally feel the rumble of butterflies in our stomachs, but the most we have to lose is a good grade.
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).
Simple phobias include irrational fears of things like animals such as dogs, cats, or the most common snakes. Specific phobias are centered around specific situations such as small spaces, claustrophobia, or heights, acrophobia. Social phobias are irrational fears of interactions with other people. For example, a person might have a social phobia of public speaking or fear of embarrassment. Another form of social phobia is agoraphobia which restraints a person from being in unfamiliar, open or closed spaces, typically resulting in panic attacks. These different types of phobias have two things in common; they are irrational, and they are treated in similar
For the aforementioned reasons, there is no doubt that fears and shy had been controlled myself throughout the years. According to The People’s Almanac presents The Book of Lists by David Wallechinsky, Irving and Amy Wallace, one of the topic was titled “The 14 Worst Human Fears”, and the fear of speaking in public is the first fear of all fears (Richard I. Garber, 2009). This make me realized that it is perfectly normal to feel anxiety and fears to speak. Everyone, even an experienced speakers has some anxiety when speaking in front of a group of people. As for my experience and situation, I should have just fight the fears in me to throw my voice out asking questions in class otherwise I would might left behind a bit and need to struggle up for the subjects more than everyone does. Asking questions does not make you any stupid, it’s the source of
Over the recent four months in Communication 1402 class, I have addressed three formal speechs and completed a number of chapters in the corresponding textbook “Communication Works”. This course of Communication aims to provide general information what public speaking is and how to address a public speaking. Recalling back the experience during the processes of completing the Speech to Imform, Speech to Persuade, and Group Presentation, I will draw a conclusion about this course and these three presentations in five aspects, comprising my previous perception of public speaking before this course; learning from the Speech to Inform; the goal and evaluation of Speech to Persuade; learning from the Group Presentation; the most important thing learned from this course.
How has public speaking become so feared? “In a study [of 9,000 people] that concentrated on fears in a social situation, their top ranking fears were public speaking, speaking up in class, meeting new people, talking to people of authority, important exams or interviews, going to parties and talking to strangers”(Lucas, 2012, pg. 9). This question has always perplexed me, because I too suffer from a fear of speaking in public. But after reading chapter one of The Art of Public Speaking, I understand now that it is a blend of different subjects that make public speaking seem so unappealing. Stephen Lucas opens this chapter on the power of public speaking, by saying “Throughout history people have used public speaking as a vital means of
Main Point 1: There are three main categories of phobias. The first category is Specific Phobias which are known as simple phobias. Specific phobias or simple phobias are usually fears about specific situations, living creatures, places, activities, or things. Examples of simple phobias is dentophobia (dentists), aerophobia (flying), claustrophobia (small spaces), and acrophobia (heights). The other two categories are Social Phobia and Agoraphobia. These two are known as complex phobias. The article “What is a Phobia?”, describes them as complex phobias because “they are linked to deep-rooted fear or anxiety about certain situations, incidents or circumstances, which make them more disabling than simple phobias.” Social phobia is also referred to as social anxiety disorder. Social phobia may be defined in which a person has an excessive and unreasonable fear of social situations. (Webmd.com) A person with social phobia finds being in social situations very difficult to handle with because of the lack of social skills or experiences that person may have. Going out to social events such as parties or functions may cause anxiety to a person with social phobia. There is that fear a person has of being embarrassed in public. People with this phobia may be afraid of a specific situation such as public speaking. Medicinenet.com defines “agoraphobia” as “a fear of being outside or otherwise being in a situation from which one either cannot escape or from which escaping would be difficult or humiliating.” The results of agoraphobia are anxiety and panic attacks. People with agoraphobia sometimes confine themselves inside their own home when symptoms are
Although constructs such as CA, communication reticence, and unwillingness-to-communicate have often been treated in literature as interchangeable, (McCroskey, 1982) particularly in earlier work, some researchers have found the need to distinguish between them. Reticence was originally thought of in relation to CA, particularly in connection with stage fright, and anxiety was identified as the causative agent that produced the characteristic behavior patterns. (McCroskey, 1977b; McCroskey, 1982) However during the 1970’s the constructs of reticence and CA evolved and changed to become quite disparate. According to McCroskey (1982) the contemporary view is that reticent people are those who do not communicate competently. Phillips (1984) further states that reticent people “avoid communication because they believe they will lose more by talking than remaining silent” (p.52). So while the construct of reticence was initially the same as CA, reticence is now perceived as a concept that represents a broad range of communicative incompetence while CA relates to communicative incompetence that stems fr...
I did have great communication skills but whenever I had to communicate in front of a group of people for some reasons I fail miserably. My public speaking fears had become worst when I got to college. I was required to take a public speaking class which I couldn’t escape in since it was one of the required courses for my degree. My first day on that class is so far the most terrible day of my life. I was asked to introduce myself to the class using only one word to describe me, the moment that my name was called it felt like I was walking into an unfamiliar galaxy. I am standing in front of a classroom full of strangers doing nothing but looking around and
In public speaking I learned many types of concepts, theories and terms of communication. In concepts of publicly speaking there’s, relaxation, practice, credibility, attention getters, attire, organization, volume, emotion, audience relation, and movement. In my first speech, “The any old bag speech” I quickly learned the do’s, don’ts and concepts of my speech performance.
There has always been a divide between introverted people and extroverted people; it is one of the first things noticed about a person. This has always been a characteristic that was thought to be innate, however recently there have been many studies attempting to define and find cause of these traits that have been coined “shyness and self-confidence”. An article written in the Social Psychology Quarterly by Philip Manning and George Ray entitled “Shyness, Self-Confidence, and Social Interaction” explores an experiment that was preformed at a mid-western university and attempts to define characteristics of shy and self-confident people during interpersonal interactions.