Phobias Flashcards
Phobias are
an overwhelming and deilitating fear of an object, place, situation, feeling or animal, irrational feal - life limiting
Symptoms of a phobia include
fast breathing, feeling sick, dry mouth, chest pain, fast heart race
Phobias tend to be
fears that would have been rational at some point in human existance - spiders/snakes
CC shows how you can
aquire a phobia as one trial learning may occur where the association is so strong
OC shows how you can maintain a phobia - positive punishment e.g
bitten by a dog, might not stroke again
SLT shows aquistion and maintenance as if a
role model is scared of something, you may have fear too, vicarious reinforcement - seeing them be comforted
Mineka and Zinbarg (2006)
did a case study of a boy who developed a vomiting phobia after witnessing his grandfather vomit while dying
CC has evidence for phobias like Watson and Rayner which used
careful controls and a standardised procedure
OC has evidence for phobias like Skinner (1948) which show
careful planning and controls
Dollinger, O’Donnell and Staley (1984) compared child survivors of a severe lightening stike to a control group and
found the survivors demonstrated more numerous and intense fear of thunder, lightening and tornadoes
Cook and Mineka (1990) found observational learning of fear in monkeys when monkeys watched a vid of other monkeys reacting to a real and toy snake….
it was found that the ppt monkeys demonstrated fear of snakes after watching the other monkeys
Kleinknecht (1982) studied members of the American Tarantula Society, among those who reported being afraid of tarantulas,
none reported a direct traumatic experience with CC therefore this is a weakness
Animals are often used in supporting studies and are not the same as humans with respect to anxiety and fear therefore
we cannot generalise the results from animal experiments to humans
An alternative explanation is evolution as
certain phobias may have helped our survival, natural selection
