Phobias

• Phobias 


  extreme fear of an object/situation/activity. The fear is disproportionate to the stimulus and is disruptive to everyday life
• Behavioural 


  what they do, an observable behaviour
• Emotional


  how they feel
• Cognitive


  what do they think
• Specific phobia 


  most common, tend to be phobias of objects
• social phobia 


  social anxiety in social situations
• agoraphobia 


  fear of open spaces, can be caused by simple phobias
• Behavioural characteristics of phobias

  Avoidance, panic, endurance
• Avoidance 


  the sufferer will go out of their way to avoid the stimulus. This will interfere with everyday life
• Panic


  crying, screaming, running away
• Endurance


  Continue in the same environment as the stimulus, but continue to experience high levels of anxiety
• Emotional characteristics


  anxiety (phobias are anxiety disorders), the emotional response is anxiety and fear. Emotional responses are unreasonable. The emotional reaction is not in line with the danger the stimulus poses
• Cognitive characteristics


  Selective attention, irrational beliefs, cognitive distortions
• Selective attention


  phobics may find it hard to look away from the stimulus, which is not useful when the fear is irrational
• Irrational beliefs 


  phobics hold irrational beliefs about the phobic stimuli . These beliefs increase the pressure on the individual
• Cognitive distortions 


  perceptions about the phobic stimulus are distorted