What are you afraid of? 

By 8th Grader Jackie Doyle Padgett

It’s a new year–that time of year many of us make resolutions, affirmations, envision a better life, vow to turn over a new leaf, get over our fears. Jackie’s interested in fears. Turns out, there is a lot to be afraid of in life: heights, dark water, spiders. And a healthy fear helps us survive: keeps us from dangling from high places, entering uncharted waters, getting bit. But, some extend their fear to clowns, mirrors, balloons, the sun. Fear–is it survival instinct? or irrational debilitation? Jackie looks at fear.

Common Fears

This section focuses on common fears you’ve probably heard about before; maybe you even have some of these fears. They might look a little bit different as I listed them by their “phobia names.” 

Acrophobia

Acrophobia is commonly known as the fear of heights. Acro comes from the Greek word akron, which means “high point.” Most people get this fear from seeing people get hurt from falling or falling themselves (Forbes Health).

People could also get this fear from a natural survival instinct that inhibits an accidental fall off of something high enough that it could kill them (Medical News Today).

Arachnophobia 

This is one of the phobias everyone knows, the fear of spiders. I have met many people who have a disliking of spiders or who are outright afraid of them. Researchers think this fear comes from multiple things, the main ones being the spiders could hurt us, or the fear is passed through scary movies (Psychology Today). The probability of someone getting hurt or dying from a spider/spider bite is very low, around one tenth of a percent. While there are around 43,000 species of spiders, a very small amount is dangerous to us–only around 30 of those could be deadly to humans (Britannica). Movies do capitalize on the scariness of spiders. There are so many where spiders will kill people–that’s literally one of the main plots for a movie called Arachnophobia.

Coulrophobia

When I was a kid I definitely had a mild version of Coulrophobia, the fear of clowns, especially at theme parks. There have been multiple studies to see why people fear these, supposedly, happy mascots. Researchers found that this fear comes mostly from pop culture and not being able to see the clown’s emotions (Scientific American).

Since they have so much makeup on, the person behind the clown face could be frowning, but we wouldn’t be able to tell. Similarly the eyebrows (which are pretty good indicators at what a person is planning/thinking) are covered. Movies/books, like IT, promote the horror of clowns. There was even a serial killer clown named John Wayne Gacy (Britannica).

Claustrophobia

I definitely have a very mild version of claustrophobia. I can’t stand being in an elevator, or a locker. It makes me feel like I’m going to be stuck there forever. Researchers think people have this fear from getting stuck in a tight space as a child. This can also be passed on if your parents have claustrophobia. Most parents will keep their child with them at all times, so if a parent has this fear, their child likely will avoid the enclosed spaces their parents have so carefully kept away from (NHS UK). I think I have this fear from getting stuck in an airplane’s bathroom, twice. I couldn’t figure out how to undo the lock (okay, I know it’s meant to be super easy, but the lock got stuck or something). 

Thalassophobia

If deep, dark, empty water has ever scared you, you might have a bit of Thalassophobia. It sometimes relates to the fear of the unknown, which makes a lot of sense. Around 95% of the deep ocean is unexplored (Ocean Wise), so that’s a lot of stuff we don’t know about just living in the ocean we swim in–how fun. This fear can also come from having been close to drowning, seeing a creature lurking in the water (sharks, whales, big fish etc…), or even hearing about someone’s bad experience with deep water (Health Line). 

Unique Fears

Most of these are fears I’ve never heard about before or knew little about. You’ll notice I use their most common name, but they have multiple names depending on where you’re from. 

Eisoptrophobia

Eisoptrophobia (or catoptrophobia, or spectrophobia) stands for the fear of mirrors. The Greek word eisoptro means mirror, and phobia, of course, means fear. There isn’t too much knowledge as to why people have this fear, but it’s probable that it comes from someone scaring you (Health Grades). For example, you entered the bathroom and were about to fix your hair when you saw something in the corner of your eye. You look into the mirror, and there is your friend creeping up behind you as a joke, and now you’re stuck with this fear of catching something creepy in the mirror. It could also do with self image problems, like you’re scared of seeing yourself in the mirror (Very Well Mind).

Globophobia

This is the fear of balloons; sometimes this fear comes with an attachment of the noise it makes when the balloon pops. Imagine going to the Winter Formal last year with this fear….Anyways–this fear is commonly started at a young age, whether you got hurt by a water balloon or someone scared you with the pop of it (Louis Laves Web). People with this phobia can also be frightened with any type of balloon including hot air balloons (Hot Air Flight).

Heliophobia

A lot of fears are unfortunate/annoying to have, but this fear, the fear of the sun, is definitely one of the worst. People have to go outside to see the sun everyday, and it’s very hard to avoid it. The word helio comes from the Greek word, hēlios, which, of course, means sun. Researchers think people who have this fear are scared of getting skin cancer or wrinkles from the sun (aka photoaging) (Lybrate).

Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia

Whoever came up with this name definitely thought they were funny. This is the fear of long words. It’s called hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia because sesquipedalian means long word. Somewhere along the way they added hippopotamus and monster (Verywell Mind). This fear is considered more of a social phobia because it commonly gives people anxiety to pronounce these long words in front of people, scared they will get judged if they mispronounce it. Most people get this fear when they are young and learning how to pronounce, for example, antidisestablishmentarianism. Maybe the teacher was being too harsh with them mispronouncing the word, or the students made fun of this person for it (Health Line).

Submechanophobia

This is the fear of underwater/partially underwater human-made objects, for example, planes, submarines, statues, ships, or any other machinery. Similar to Thalassophobia, this fear also could come from a fear of the unknown, fear of losing control or bad past experiences (Very Well Mind, India Times). These experiences could include being on a ship/plane that crashed and sunk (Dove Med). 

Trypophobia 

Last but not least, the fear of holes grouped together in some sort of pattern. If someone with this fear sees a cluster of holes in food or flowers, etc… It might cause them to have a gag reflex. This is under the phobia category, but people with this fear aren’t really scared of it, they’re mostly disgusted (Cleveland Clinic). Researchers think that people get this fear by a survival instinct in their brain telling them that these patterns could be dangerous. For example, the holes are reminiscent of spider eyes, or a deadly skin disease, etc…. Another reason for the fear could be that it takes a lot of brain power to look at complicated patterns, which could cause people some distress (Osmosis).

I find that fear is such an interesting thing–look at all these different fearsome phobias. Of course, I missed a lot; there’s practically a fear of everything and anything. If you know any fun facts about a fear I didn’t cover, I’d love to know about it. Tell me about your favorite phobia!