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fears Flashcards

1
Q

physiological fear

A
  • racing heart
  • sweaty palms
  • butterflies
  • shaky
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2
Q

behavioural fear

A
  • urge to flee
  • frozen
  • defensive
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3
Q

cognitive fear

A
  • worry
  • can’t think straight
  • impending sense of doom
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4
Q

assessed

A
  • directly
  • retrospectively
  • e.g. child interviews, questionnaires, parent/teacher report
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5
Q

normal childhood fears are:

A
  • commonly experienced
  • relatively mild
  • appear and disappear spontaneously
  • follow predictable pattern
  • decrease with age
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6
Q

Gullone 2000 interview review

A
  • 4-19 year olds
  • average no. of fears 2-5/child
  • general themes: animal, injury, unknown, social concerns
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7
Q

Baur 1976 what are you afraid of most?

A
  • ages 4-12
  • ‘what are you most afraid of’
  • 4-6: monsters/ghosts
  • 6-8: nightmares
    10-12: injury/physical danger

injury fears increase with age

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8
Q

ollendick1983: fear survey schedule for children FSSC

A
  • 80 items
  • measure of children’s fear in response to specific situations
  • none/some/a lot
  • measures number, severity and types of fears children experience

gave rise to 5 reliable factors

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9
Q

Ollendick FSSC 5 reliable factors

A
  • fear of danger and death
  • fear of failure and criticism
  • fear of the unknown
  • fear of animals
  • stress and medical fears
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10
Q

FSSC methodological issues

A
  • outdated and contemporary threats not yet included e.g. climate change not a thing yet
  • lacks cultural inclusivity
  • can only measure what is included
  • doesn’t count frequency of fears or how uncomfortable children find the though of a situation
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11
Q

Ollendick et al: FSSC in context

A
  • almost 1200 children
  • 7-16 - 3 groups
  • average of 14 fears reported
  • most common: dangerous situations and physical harm
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11
Q

moderators of childhood fears

A
  • gender
  • cultural variation
  • socioeconomic effects
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12
Q

gender and fears -Ollendick again

A
  • girls report more fears than boys
  • fears were highest for death/danger items
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13
Q

gender effects - more

discrimiantions

why?

A
  • things that mostly discriminated between boys and girls: rats, spiders snakes, alone, dreams

why?

gender role orientation: children are socialised differently according to biological sex - raised to develop attributes in line with this - may influence fear

high femineity and low masculinity = more anxiety and avoidance

  • gender orientation greater predictor than biological sex
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14
Q

cultural variation and fears

western

A

western countries = consistent:

  • fear decreases with age
  • girls more
  • content appears to have similar developmental pattern
    (but some details differ based on location e.g. sharks - australia)
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15
Q

cultural variation within countries

A

hispanic youth display higher fear and anxiety than white youth

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16
Q

Ollendick cross cultural variation

A
  • 1200 cross cultural sample 7-17
  • FSSC
  • higher fear in nigeria and china compared to america and australia
  • always highest for girls except for in nigeria
  • west: fears decrease with age
  • nigeria: decrease not evident
  • china: peak anxiety in late childhood

ghosts - china
foolish - usa
ocean - nigeria
guns - australia

17
Q

why? cross cultural variation

A

collectivist cultures emphasis self control, social inhibition, compliance with social norms === greater anxiety

18
Q

socioeconomic effects on fear

A
  • Lower SES = more fears Croake
  • Lower SES: animals, strangers, abandonment, death, violence

Middle/upper SES: heights, ill health, rollercoasters, pet’s safety

19
Q

why socioeconomic differences?

A

children in low SES are exposed to more uncertainty and more threats which can lead to enhanced fear and anxiety

20
Q

developmental patterns

A
  • childhood fears may develop and dissappear and predictable points
21
Q

infant fears

A

loud noises, separations, unusual stimuli

22
Q

4-8 fears

A

ghosts, imaginary creatures and animals

23
Q

10-12 fears

A

social fears and self injury

24
age fear patterns map onset of phobias
height and water phobias = start in infancy animal phobias = start ages 7-9 social phobias = pre adolescence
25
innate fears
- spider and snakes etc - evolutionary - could kill
26
Bauer 1976 fears
monsters and ghosts decrease with age injury and danger increases with age
27
Westernberg developmental patterns
- 882 ps - 8-18 years - physical e.g. monsters, animals fears decrease over age - social fears increase with age
28
fears can be ..
- learned through conditioning experiences - innate, predisposed
29
evolutionary approach
- natural sections favours individuals who rapidly learn about threats that pose danger = survival - fear system evolved to focus on threats at the ages at which those threats were of the greatest risk - some are innate - not leaned - some we are prepared to acquire with little to no learning
30
cognitive approach
- fear originates from conceptualisation of threat - this depends on child's cognitive and physical abilities - as cognitive abilities e.g. memory, self control, TofM fear and anxiety becomes more sophisticated - range of fear-provoking stimuli broadens and cognitive features of anxiety e.g. worry broadens
31
infant fear: separation
evolutionary account: keeps child within protective distance of carer = maximum survival cognitive account: at 9months children are able to differentiate between familiar and unfamiliar faces so stranger fear develops
32
infant fear: environmental stimuli
evolutionary account: young children are defenceless so fear lots of environmental stimuli cognitive account: cognitive capabilities = limited, so fear is of immediate environmental threats
33
middle childhood fear: imaginary creatures/dark
evolutionary acocount: childrena re now exploring env independently, important to fear predators/danger for survival cognitive account: developments of magical thinking = monster fear
34
middle childhood fear: small animals
evolutionary account: fear system has evolved to prioritise threats of animals/unknown cognitive account: emerges as physical mobility and awareness of external environment increases
35
adolescence fears: social
evolution: social position within group can mean survival or not cognitive: abstract thinking and understanding of cause and effect - allows for these fears to emerge
36
adolescense fears: injury and general worry
evolution: fear system evolved to prioritise rapid learning about threats within social world cognitive: increased egocentrism leads to sensitivity to evaluations and insults to self
37
cognitive view evidence
- 250 ps - 3-14 - asked about worries - assessed ability to catastrophise - correlation found between child's age/cognitive development and ability to elaborate on worries and show fear
38
cognitive mediation model
greater age = greater cognitive development = greater worry elaboration = greater personal worry - increased age and cognitive maturation gives rise to ability to worry
39
evolution evidence
- very hard to study - fears may be present from birth - 8-10 months scared of snakes and spiders cross culturally, and amongst other animals - supports theory that innate to survive - infants form faster associations between snakes and fear than with snakes and happiness - find spiders and snakes in visual search quicker than flowers and mushrooms - but we can not prove that this is actually fear - don't avoid looking - no avoidance - parent reporting - may just reflect parental fear
40
rapid detection mechanism
- may just have characteristics that infants are more likely to pay attention to
41
perceptual template
rapidly detects things that have shape/movement of snakes/spiders

Developmental Psychology (15 decks)

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