Specific phobias – one type of anxiety
From the book – Chapter 8: Anxiety Disorders
Specific phobias
Main feature: marked fear or anxiety about a specific object or situation (heights, flying, animals, blood, injections, enclosed spaces, storms).
Characteristics: fear is out of proportion to actual danger; the situation is avoided or endured with intense anxiety; the fear causes significant distress or impairment. Phobias are common and highly treatable, often with exposure-based therapy.
Read the full chapter – Chapter 8: Anxiety Disorders
Stories from real life
- The Night My Heart Raced – Arjun, twenty-nine, was in a crowded Mumbai local train when his heart suddenly pounded, his hands tingled, his chest tightened and he felt sure he was…
- What If Tonight Goes Wrong? – Meera is a forty-two-year-old mother in Hyderabad who cannot remember the last day she did not worry. What if her son fails? What if her husband's…
- The Back Row – Tomás, nineteen, studies engineering in Lisbon. He is clever, but he sits at the back of every class, never asks a question and hurries out. Eating…
- The Lizard on the Wall – Sunita, thirty-eight, lives in a village near Nashik and cares for her family with great energy, except when a lizard appears. Last month one dropped near…
Shloks
- Bhagavad Gita 6.34 – The mind is restless, agitating, strong and stubborn. To hold it, I think, is as hard as to hold the wind.
More on this topic: Anxiety, panic attacks and fear – signs, causes and what helps
More questions
- Agoraphobia – one type of anxiety
- Separation anxiety disorder – one type of anxiety
- Selective mutism – one type of anxiety
- What causes anxiety?
- Understanding anxiety and the body
- How is anxiety treated?
- Psychological therapies in the treatment of anxiety
- Medicines in the treatment of anxiety
- Lifestyle and self-help — support, do not replace, professional treatment in the treatment of anxiety
- Anxiety in children and adolescents – what to know about anxiety
- How to calm anxiety – simple techniques for daily life
- Is it normal worry or an anxiety disorder?