Psychologist & Hypnotherapist in Bromley

Phobias

A Phobia is a irrational fear response to a specific stimulus. This generally results in the person avoiding any situations in which they may encounter this stimulus.

Phobias arising from an initial fearful encounter can spread to other stimuli. For example, being sick in public once might lead to a fear of eating in any public place. It could also be learned from others. For example, a child can learn to fear spiders because of the mother’s phobic reaction to them. Some phobias are social anxieties where there is a feeling of trepidation about being judged by others and therefore being unable to perform. An example of this would be the fear of speaking in public.

Phobias can be linked to general anxiety such as panic attacks where the person feels safe only in certain environments such as their own home, or to other conditions such as obsessive compulsive disorder or posttraumatic stress disorder.

Phobias can be treated with certain types of anti- depressants aimed at reducing anxiety levels, and by cognitive behaviour therapy which attempts to replace the irrational fear with a more rational response. In my experience, I have found that using desensitisation using hypnosis and gradually habituating to the fear response, coupled with reframing the original fearful encounter is the most effective type of treatment.

However, sometimes phobias are symptomatic of a deeper psychological problem and therefore it is necessary to find the real source of the fear.

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