BrodyR's Current Event

Phobias

What Are They?

By: Brody Richards

Article: Why do we develop certain irrational phobias?

Author: Andrew Watts

Article Completed on Jan. 1, 2014

Phobias, phobias are irrational fears that different humans develop. But what else do you know about them? Where do they come from? Why do we get them? Can we “cure” them?......Well, phobias can be developed in different ways, usually fear triggers the instinct of fight-or-flight, this allows animals to quickly react to potential predators around them. Human phobias are different in which it is typically an irrational fear of one thing, either an object, or a scenario. Specific phobia is estimated to affect around 9 percent of all Americans in their life-span. Well, now we know that fears are to keep animals alive and phobias are completely irrational and only focused on one thing, but about how they come about? Two ways phobias can be developed is through genetics and certain environmental factors. In the genetics area scientists estimate that genetics contribute to the development of phobias between 25 to 65 percent. Knowing this we should be able to learn many more things about phobias and in certain cases origin right? Well, kind of… scientists may know that phobias can develop from genetics, but that doesn’t help too much given the fact that we don’t know which genes play a part. So,that means we don’t know much further than that. Well, now one way has been covered let’s go onto the second possibility. Let’s talk about another way phobias develop, do you remember earlier on the mentioning of environmental factors? Okay, environmental factors are quite different. While genes are passed down, environmental components starts all in our heads. This development of phobias is caused by certain frightening events that you have gone through in your life. Sometimes this traumatic event is something you may may have heard about or watched or actually been in. But again this should be pretty easy to find the origin of too right, I mean if it was that traumatizing you should know right? Wrong again, you see it’s actually quite difficult in the environmental scenario as well. Here, I’ll give you an idea of how hard it can be to find out, think about a fear you have like heights, or flying, snakes, spiders, needles, etc. Got one? Now try and think how you’re afraid of that, what made you afraid of that object/event? Hard isn’t it? Anyway, that’s my point is it’s hard to really ever know for sure. Now even though we might not know much about phobias besides possible origin, it doesn’t mean they completely control us. Scientists have made great feat in “curing” them. So far we use exposure therapy as the most effective and efficient way to get rid of  phobias, it is typically done in 10 sessions. Exposure therapy is when a person is to interact with that fear, and find that it isn’t as scary as originally thought. Will we ever know everything about phobias? Probably, far into the future with new technology, but until then I think we know enough.

This article in my opinion was very fun to read on and learn about, given that's the kind of work I like to do. I actually found this article by giving topic ideas for the same project to a friend, and as soon as I said it I changed my original topic choices immediately. I think the reason this intrigued me is because I enjoy the human brain and how it works and develops certain things. I believe I also gravitated toward this topic because I have developed several different phobias in my life. After researching this topic I went on to discover more about phobias, if you want it here you go: http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Phobias.aspx that article is actually much more in depth and detailed so if you enjoyed this written piece I recommend you check it out. Thank you for reading my writing on what I researched and I hope you enjoyed.

Original article: "Why Do We Develop Certain Irrational Phobias?" Scientific American. N.p., n.d.

    Web. 18 Jan. 2016. <http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/

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