Phobias are characterised by excessive fear and anxiety, triggered by an object, place or situation. The extent of the fear is out of proportion to any real danger presented by the phobic stimulus. The DSM-5 recognises 3 categories of phobia and related anxiety disorders;

Specific phobia - phobia of an object e.g. animal or a situation e.g. flying
Social anxiety - phobia of social situations e.g. public speaking
Agoraphobia - phobia of being outside or in a public place

Behavioural Characteristics of Phobias:

Panic - A phobic person may panic in response to the presence of a phobic stimulus. Panicking may involve crying, screaming or running away. Children may react slightly differently e.g. freezing, clinging or having a tantrum
Avoidance - Some people tend to go to a lot of effort to avoid coming into contact with the phobic stimulus. This can make it hard to go about daily life e.g. someone who has a fear of using public toilets may have to limit the amount of time they spend outside the house in relation to how long they can last without a toilet
Endurance - Endurance is where a sufferer remains in the presence of the phobic stimulus but continues to experience high levels of anxiety. This may be unavoidable in some situations e.g. someone who is afraid of flying

Emotional Characteristics of Phobias:

Anxiety - Anxiety is an unpleasant state of high arousal. This prevents the sufferer relaxing and makes it very difficult to experience any positive emotion e.g. arachnophobics will have increased anxiety levels when in a place associated with spiders

Cognitive Characteristics of Phobias:

Selective Attention - If a sufferer can see the phobic stimulus it is hard to look away from it. Keeping our attention on something really dangerous is a good thing as it gives us the best chance of reacting quickly to a threat. However this is not so useful when the fear is irrational
Irrational Beliefs - A phobic may hold irrational beliefs in relation to phobic stimuli e.g. people with social anxiety hold beliefs such as 'I must always sound intelligent' These beliefs come from te pressure on the person to perform well in social situations
Cognitive Distortions - The phobics perceptions of the phobic stimulus may be distorted e.g. someone who is scared of snakes may see them as slimy and aggressive looking

	Created by Caitlyn Grayston over 7 years ago

AS level Psychology (Psychopathology) Note on Phobias, created by Caitlyn Grayston on 20/05/2017.