Behavioural Characteristics

Panic- A phobic person may panic in response to the presence of the phobic stimulus. Panic may involve a range of behaviours including crying, screaming or running away. Children may react slightly differently, for example by freezing, clinging or having a tantrum

Avoidance- Unless the sufferer is making a conscious effort to face their fear they tend to go to a lot of effort to avoid coming into contact with the phobic stimulus. This can make it hard to go about daily life. For example, someone with a fear of public toilets may have to limit the time they spend outside the home in relation to how long they can last without a toilet. This in turn can interfere with work, education and a social life.

Endurance- The alternative to avoidance is endurance, in which a sufferer remains in the presence of the phobic stimulus but continues to experience high levels of anxiety. This may be unavoidable in some situation, for example for a person who has an extreme fear of flying.

Emotional Characteristics

Anxiety- Phobias are classed as anxiety disorders. By definition then they involve an emotional response of anxiety and fear. Anxiety is an unpleasant state of high arousal. This prevents the sufferer relaxing and makes it very difficult to experience any positive emotion. Anxiety can be long term. Fear is the immediate and extremely unpleasant response we experience when we encounter or think about the phobic stimulus.

Emotional responses are unreasonable- The emotional responses we experience in relation to phobic stimuli go beyond what is reasonable. For example if an arachnophobic sees a small harmless spider they are likely to have a strong emotional response, which is disproportionate to the danger posed by any spider met in the house.

Cognitive Characteristics

Selective attention to the phobic stimulus- If a sufferer can see the phobic stimulus it is hard to look away from it. Keeping our attention on something really dangerous is a good thing as it gives us the best chance of reacting quickly to a threat, but this is not so useful when the fear is irrational. A pogonophobic will struggle to concentrate on what they are doing if there is someone with a beard in the room.

Irrational beliefs- A phobic may hold irrational beliefs in relation to phobic stimuli. For example, social phobias can involve beliefs like ‘I must always sound intelligent’ or ‘if I blush people will think I’m weak’. This kind of belief increases the pressure on the sufferer to perform well in social situations.

Cognitive distortions-