Phobia

Introduction

Phobias are anxiety diss that can have a significant impact on a person 's lifestyle , due to the distress and symptoms suffered . A phobia is a persistent irrational fear of an object or a situation that 's generally considered harmless . Accompanying the fear is a strong desire to avoid the situation ,and an inability to function normally in social settings . Phobias are among several anxiety diss , which also include panic dis , post-traumatic stress dis obsessive-compulsive dis and generalized anxiety dis . More than 12 percent of the population experiences a phobia

at some point in life , making this dis the most common mental illness (wikipedia .com

Phobias were first recognised as separate diagnostic categories using the international Classification of Diseases (WHO 1992 ) and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual in the late 1940s and early 50s . At present , DSM IV (APA 1994 ) has three classifications of phobic diss : agoraphobia social phobia and specific phobias . The phobic diss cause similar and significant changes in behaviour , cognitions and physiological actions (physical feelings of anxiety . The assessment is , therefore , crucial in understanding which of the three phobias a person might be suffering . All these diss have a significant effect on a person 's daily life , such as work , relationships , hobbies and interests , and can really disturb the social and personal life of the person

Definitions and diagnostic criteria

Agoraphobia

The DSM-IV (APA 1994 ) definition of agoraphobia is .anxiety about or avoidance of , places or situations from which escape might be difficult (or embarrassing , or in which help may not be available in the event of having a panic attack or panic-like symptoms . The important issue in this definition is that there is usually a fear of having panic-like symptoms and being unable to escape the place . There are three DSM-IV criteria that must be met before a diagnosis of agoraphobia can be made . These are

Anxiety about , or avoidance of , places or situations from which escape might be difficult (or embarrassing , or in which help may not be available in the event of having a panic attack or panic-like symptoms (APA 1994 . This might include places such as buses , queues and shops

Triggers are either avoided or endured with marked anxiety and distress

The anxiety or avoidance is not accounted for by another dis , such as post-traumatic stress dis (Rogers and Liness 1999 , or obsessive compulsive dis

Social phobia

The DSM-IV (APA 1994 ) definition of social phobia is .clinically significant anxiety provoked by exposure to certain types of social performance situations , often leading to avoidance behaviour . This can include writing public speaking , eating in public etc

The important aspect in this definition is that there is usually a fear of one 's own social performance (such as saying or doing something embarrassing ) and a fear of negative evaluation by others is common This differs from agoraphobia , where being unable to escape a specific place causes the anxiety . There are six main adult DSM-IV criteria that must be met before a diagnosis of social phobia...