Snakes (the real kind). It’s snakes that do it for me. Whether I see them in a zoo or in a film, they give me the creeps. People tell me I have a phobia. I tell them it’s stuff and nonsense. What I have is a very real knowledge that snakes are “ugh”.

It’s amazing how many types of phobias exist. Whoever heard of plutophobia, which is a fear of wealth? How about heliophobia, a fear of the sun, or kainolophobia, which is a fear of anything new? Weird isn’t it?

A friend of mine in England suffers from lachanophobia, which is a fear of vegetables. More specifically stated in her case, root vegetables. Her days, at all costs, are spent avoiding anything to do with vegetables. A fear of root vegetables may sound bizarre to some people, but for others it’s a real issue.

Another person I know in Malta suffers from trypanophobia, which is a fear of infections. Every time he looks at a syringe his heart rate increases, his muscles tense up, his jaw clamps and it brings on the feeling that all he wants to do is run as fast as he can.

What strikes me as very odd is that phobia sufferers are nearly always aware that their phobia is excessive or unreasonable in comparison either with the actual threat it represents or with the less fearful responses of other non-phobic people.

Can’t they just pull themselves together, one wonders? All I know is that it’s not easy. Take frigophobia, for example, which is a fear of cold things, or hacrophobia, a fear of long waits. How do you explain it when no trauma seems to define a fear of the said cold things and the long waits? Yet for the sufferer it is very, very real.

What changes an otherwise perfectly normal human being into a sweating, gasping wreck is unclear. Some researchers believe that phobias can be traced back to ancient man and his strong natural instinct for survival.

Another theory states that fears are learnt, that seeing dad jump on to a chair, screaming, at the sight of a spider is enough to turn you into an anachnophobic for life. Others say that phobias are born through first-hand experience. I guess some people acquire phobias because they have had traumatic experiences with their phobic stimulus, for example a bad day at the dentist.

The thing is that phobias are universal. The type of phobia may vary from culture to culture but every culture has them. Let’s take Taijin-Kyofu-sho, for example, which is a common Japanese syndrome characterised by a fear of embarrassing or offending other people. This is rather different to the western syndrome of social phobia, where fear is based on the public embarrassment experienced by the phobic individuals themselves.

There are also a number of important cross-cultural differences in animal fears. For example, while fear of spiders is a common phobic reaction in most western cultures, spiders are significantly less feared in India where insect phobia is more likely to focus itself on a fear of centipedes.

History shows that phobias are not a 21st century problem. Sigmund Freud wrote at great length about phobias and there are endless reports of phobias right down the ages.

What is needed is exposure therapy, where the phobic patient is steered into a situation where they are exposed first-hand to the object of their fear.

Take my friend from England, for example. First she might be shown a picture of root vegetables in a book, then a turnip might be brought for her to see. The aim would be that my friend would be trying to hold and even eat the offending turnip.

I imagine that using exposure therapy to treat a fear of vegetables is a lot easier than using it to treat albuminurophobia (kidney disease), astrophobia (fear of celestial space) or taphephobia (fear of being buried alive) but that’s for doctors to decide. What’s important is that it works.

Valerie Borg

VALLETTA