Fear Research Papers

The fear of heights, the fear of blood dripping from a paper cut, what would you describe this sensation? The feeling of fear to a particular thing is known as a phobia. Like many other organisms, we can develop fears or phobias from past experiences dealing with that particular situation. You may wonder what causes these emotions and how it is interpreted. Research shows that the brain or parts of the brain have different functions and one part of the brain is proven to regulate fear and your emotions which are then stored. The brain plays an important part to how fear works. Since there are many functions in the brain, other parts can also be an important factor to phobias.Though, does it really show in a person’s daily activity? Phobias …show more content…
Phobias or an example would be the phobia of spiders. The fear or phobia of spiders is referred to as arachnophobia. The term is specifically referring to the fear of spiders. Another research progresses through the way fear works. Fear is a cause of something that then triggers an effect. The effect would be like the emotion that piles up from the fear. We get symptoms and our brain focuses on the current situation.The amygdala, an almond-shaped like tissue, has a function which stores fear emotions and can interpret them( D'Arcy Lyness).Another part is the hypothalamus, it is responsible for the “flight to fight” situation. Other parts, like the sensory cortex, is also involved in receiving or sending off data to and from the brain.Upon my research, there were many important information being taken to consider the fact that if phobias do affect a person. Though, I learned that the amygdala is responsible for sending data to two routes of the brain, the thalamus and the medial prefrontal cortex(“The Amygdala: The Body’s Alarm Clock System”). The first route is considered the shorter route, which prepares for the situation immediately even though it hasn’t occurred. The second route is the data being sent to the prefrontal cortex, or the route that interprets data and plans out the action right after the situation has occurred(“Mental Health …show more content…
There are three types of phobias. The first type of phobia is known as, Social Phobia. Unlike the other types of phobias, social phobia is mainly phobias that affect a person dealing with the interaction with other people. The second type of phobia is specific phobias, or phobias having to do with a specific object. Some examples include arachnophobia, ophidiophobia, and acrophobia. These phobias deal specifically with a certain object, which is the fear of spiders, fear of snake, and the fear of heights. The third type of phobia is known as agoraphobia, or phobias dealing with enclosed spaces(“Mental Health America”). These type of phobias deal with situations that involved such things as being in a house, going to a public area, or riding on a vehicle. Though the amygdala plays a big role in the way fear is regulated, scientific studies prove that it is not necessarily an output by the amygdala. An experimental study shows that a women with a genetic disorder that causes the amygdalae to harden, had fearless emotions when exposed to fearful animals(Shere Jeremy). Though, when the person was exposed to harmful CO2, fear and panic started to arise. The conclusion was that the amygdala was not needed to create fear and panic(Shere Jeremy). As it is seen now, evidence show that the amygdala does not control fear, but is still important in the events of