Phobias

Question 1

What is a phobia?

Answer 1

• An irrational fear of an object or situation

Question 1

What are the 3 categories of phobias, accoridng to DSM-5?

Answer 1

• Specific phobia
• Social anxiety/phobia
• Agoraphobia

Question 2

What is a specific phobia?

Answer 2

• Phobia of an object, such as an animal or body part, or a situation, such as flying or getting an injection

Question 3

What is a social phobia?

Answer 3

• Phobia of a social situation such as public speaking or using a public toilet

Question 4

What is agoraphobia?

Answer 4

• Phobia of being outside or in a public place

Question 5

What are the behavioural characteristics of phobias?

Answer 5

• Panic (may include: crying, screaming, running away, freezing, clining, tantrums)
• Avoidance (going to a lot of effort to avoid coming into contact with the stimulus)
• Endurance (when a person chooses to remain in the presence of their phobic stimulus)

Question 6

What are the emotional characteristics of phobias?

Answer 6

• Anxiety (state of high arousal, preventing a person from relaxing and makes it hard to experience positive emotion)
• Fear (immediate and unpleasant response when we encounter a fear stimulus)
• Unreasonable emotional response (anxiety/fear is greater than normal and is disproportionate to any threat posed)

Question 7

What are the cognitive characteristics of phobias?

Answer 7

• Selective attention to stimulus (hard to look away, keeping attention on the stimulus gives us the best chance of reacting to a threat quickly)
• Irrational belief (unfounded faults in relation to phobic stimuli)
• Cognitive distortions (perceptions of the person with a phobia may see the stimulus as something it s not)