WHAT ARE YOU SCARED OF? Mr. Prael A phobia (from Greek: φόβος, phobos, "fear"), is an irrational, intense, persistent fear of certain situations, activities, things, or people. The main symptom of this disorder is the excessive, unreasonable desire to avoid the feared subject. When the fear is beyond one's control, or if the fear is interfering with daily life, then a diagnosis under one of the anxiety disorders can be made. Phobias (in the clinical meaning of the term) are the most common form of anxiety disorders. An American study by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) found that between 8.7% and 18.1% of Americans suffer from phobias. Broken down by age and gender, the study found that phobias were the most common mental illness among women in all age groups and the second most common illness among men older than 25. Since the creation of the verbal definition of a particular phobia is always Latin, the mental disorder itself is in some way related to its Latin roots. Example Megalophobia means fear of large things How do you know this? Mega = Latin/Greek for Large + Phobia = Fear 11 16 10 12 14 17 18 32 34 29 37 Across Fear of noises or voices or one's own voice Fear of women 11 Fear of cats 13 Fear of dancing 14 Fear of bulls 16 Fear of anything new 17 Fear of flying 21 Fear of germs 25 Fear of dentists 27 Fear of fish 30 Fear of wild animals 31 Fear of disease 32 Fear of urine or urinating 33 Fear of skin lesions 26 28 36 23 31 30 19 25 24 27 15 35 33 22 20 21 13 Down Fear of numbers Fear of the number 666 Fear of home Fear of opening one's eyes Fear of knees Fear of cold or cold things Fear of heights Fear of Japanese 10 Fear of witches and witchcraft 12 Fear of poison or of being accidently poisoned 15 Fear of xrays 18 Fear of stealing 19 Fear or hatred of poetry 20 Fear of God or gods 34 Fear of horses 35 Fear of computers 36 Fear of things to the left or lefthanded 37 Fear of writing in public 22 Fear of the color black 23 Fear of words 24 Fear of foreign languages 26 Fear of the opposite sex 28 Fear of failure 29 Fear of smells