What is a phobia? There are a lot of anxiety conditions out there that people have to deal with daily. Some are common and things we´ve heard of like agoraphobia and social phobia and some are less common or less well known. These conditions arise when the preoccupation with worry has become so acute that you are no longer engaging in your normal routines. 

Some of the common fears that can turn into angst driven nightmares are normal things that many people get nervous over but don´t avoid entirely. For example, many phobias center on the fear of going to the dentist, fear of thunder or lightning, fear of illness or fear of animals or elevators. Some of these fears don´t have a daily impact on our lives but they can have long term effects on our health or mental well being.

A phobia is simply an irrational fear that is intense and persistent. The fear is directed at a particular activity, situation or person.  People with these problems will go to almost any length to avoid that which they fear. If you are worried about going to the dentist, decades may pass without a visit, you may ignore tooth pain, and try ways to self medicate or simply ignore the discomfort and hope it goes away.

This approach could of course leave you with a serious medical problem. These conditions make you avoid activities and people even if you know you should not.
 
More than 10% of the American population suffers from excessive fear at one time or another. Phobias also affect more women than men. Most specific disorders like fear of animals, fear of the elevator and fear of airplanes can usually be explained by some triggering or traumatic event that happened in your formative fears.

A close encounter with a dog, a dog bite or threat might lead to a lifetime fear or anxiousness around dogs. The triggering event doesn´t have to be that obvious though, it could be you were scared by a TV program and had bad dreams about that topic for a few nights and developed an intense fear.

Both specific phobias and more pervasive problems like social phobia and agoraphobia can be dealt with. You can stop avoiding the things that frighten you and tackle new experiences in your life. Don´t let worry control your life any longer. Go see your daughter´s play, talk to your boss about a raise, and ask out the cute receptionist you´ve been in love with for years. 

There are solutions for every problem; you just have to find them. A good starting point in conquering your fear is to rationalize the apprehension. You have to convince yourself that there really is no reason for the intense dread you feel. You may have been bitten by a dog when you were young but that doesn´t mean every dog will bite you. Some dogs are very nice, think Lassie. 

While you may not be eager to adopt a furry four legged friend from the animal shelter, you also don´t need to cross the street every time you see a dog or avoid going to people´s houses that have dogs. When you encounter uncomfortable things, like a dog, be armed with some positive thoughts to counteract your body´s adrenaline surge and the temptation to flee as quickly as possible.

Social phobia or social anxiety disorder is a common anxiety disorder that millions of Americans struggle with everyday. It is a fear of embarrassment or humiliation in situations where other people are scrutinizing your actions or statements. 

The fear that social phobics experience is above and beyond the normal unease that people might feel before speaking in front of an audience, performing a play or going to a cocktail party filled with strangers. The fear and anxiety are so strong that they cause you to obsess over the event or avoid the situation altogether. 

Your concern will be out of proportion to the situation, you will recognize it is excessive but will be unable to avoid thinking that you will say or do something that others will judge to be stupid, weak, anxious or just plain crazy. The detrimental impact that this phobia can have on the lives of sufferers is limitless.   

The most common manifestation of social phobia is a problem with public speaking. This fear affects actors, lawyers, people who have to give speeches, presentations and performances in front of others and students who have to speak in front of the class.

Other common manifestations include:

-  Fear of blushing in public

-  Fear of choking on or spilling food while eating in public

-  Fear of being watched at work

-  Fear of using public bathrooms

-  Fear or writing or signing documents in front of others

-  Fear of crowds

-  Fear of taking tests

Social phobia doesn´t have to be so specific though. In many cases, it will just be a generalized anxiety about any social or group interaction where you feel you are being watched or evaluated. 

If your fear covers a broad range of situations such as starting conversations, chatting in small groups, speaking to authority figures, dating, going to parties and other social interactions then you have generalized social phobia.

Social anxiety and nervousness are present in most people and part of normal life. You would only be diagnosed as phobic if your avoidance tactics interfere with work, social activities or important relationships, or cause you considerable distress. 

You can have panic attacks when you have social phobia although that is not a necessary component. The panic attacks are related to being embarrassed or humiliated not necessarily being trapped or confined as with agoraphobia. Social anxiety also crops up at an earlier age than agoraphobia. 

For children, the condition is often diagnosed in late childhood or early adolescence and becomes a problem when children start facing peer pressure at school. Like other anxieties and fear, this phobia can be dealt with. Like most fears, you need to gradually face your fears head on and work to overcome the fear of embarrassment and the worry of rejection. 

Particularly effective techniques in battling this condition are imagery desensitization and real-life exposure. In addition, improving your assertiveness and self-esteem will also help in confronting and managing your social fears.

Claustrophobia. Agoraphobia. Triskaidekaphobia. All of these names have one thing in common: they add mystery and confusion to what is already one of the most poorly understood aspects of human behavior.

Phobias have always been classified according to their obvious triggers; the objects or situations that provoke the fear. These triggers are customarily dressed in exotic Greek and Latin labels, giving each phobia a more scientific air.

Unfortunately, the traditional phobic classification system has shed little light on the real, but hidden mechanisms responsible for creating and shaping phobic behavior. In fact, this Greek and Latin name-calling may have done a great deal of harm.

For instead of encouraging us to search for underlying common denominators capable of unlocking the many secrets of phobic behavior, it has led many to believe that these secrets are already known.

Even worse, this classification system has unintentionally led many of the doctors believe that each and every type of phobia i.e. xenophobia, aerophobia, etc. is a separate and distinct disorder with a unique cause having no relation to other phobias aside from the obvious similarity in symptoms.

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

The drawbacks of the traditional classification system are best illustrated with a few examples.

Suppose that a woman is cynophobic and agoraphobic. What do these two labels tell us, apart from the fact that she is afraid of dogs and wide-open spaces?

According to the current classification system, this woman suffers from two separate phobic illnesses, each requiring individual treatment. But what if her fear of dogs stems from a realistic fear of being chased by a dog into a wide-open space, namely, the street (realistic, because it has happened to her). If so, her fear of dogs is clearly part and parcel of her fear of wide-open spaces. The two are not separate disorders.

The connection between this woman’s agoraphobia and her gynophobia is vital if she is to receive proper treatment. But the traditional classification system does not encourage doctors to look for such interrelationships. Let’s look at another example.

Fear of Flying:

Four men suffer from aerophobia, the fear of flying. Although all four men are classified as having the same illness, a closer examination might reveal that each fears flying for a completely different reason.

One man, for example, may be afraid to fly because his neighbor recently died in a plane crash. Another may be afraid because planes fly over water and he can’t swim, hence he does not fear all flying, just flying over water. The third may be afraid of small enclosed spaces, such as the cabin of an airplane. And the fourth man may be afraid of heights.

Each of these possibilities suggests something entirely different about the mechanisms responsible for the fear of flying. More important, these differences clearly demonstrate that each case may require a different treatment approach.

But once we label all four men “aerophobic,” we unwittingly make a tragic mistake. For our label implies that one common mechanism is responsible for the fears of all four men. This makes no more sense than assuming that four men with the same name have the same mother. Yet in essence, this is exactly what we are doing.

This kind of mistake can only encourage physicians and other therapists to search for answers in all the wrong directions. Worse, it encourages them to subject all four men to the same treatment regimen. At best, the results of this kind of treatment approach will be less than satisfactory for at least three of the four.

Two Flaws in the System:

These examples clearly illustrate that two important characteristics of phobic behavior are masked by our traditional classification system:

• Phobias of different names may have one and the same underlying mechanism.
• Phobias of the same name may have distinctly different underlying mechanisms.

Superficial phobic triggers provide an important clue to understanding phobic behavior, but they are only one aspect of the highly complex phobic phenomenon.

By focusing only on these triggers, we are ignoring the far more important underlying mechanisms that create and shape phobic behavior. This interferes with our ability to make an accurate diagnosis and prevents us from developing a successful treatment approach.