Aerophobia

What is aerophobia?

It is defined as a persistent, irrational fear of flying in airplanes for fear that they will crash, more known this phobia as the “fear of flying”, this phobia greatly affects the welfare of people who depend on flights, and be it for family life or work.

Symptom

  • Accused and persistent fear that is excessive or irrational, triggered by the presence or anticipation of a specific object or situation (eg, flying, precipices, animals, administration of injections, vision of blood).

  • Exposure to phobic stimulation almost invariably causes an immediate anxiety response, which may take the form of a crisis of situational distress or more or less related to a given situation.

  • The person recognizes that this fear is excessive or irrational.

  • The situation (s) phobic (s) are avoided or supported at the cost of intense anxiety or discomfort.

  • Avoidance behaviors, anxious anticipation, or discomfort provoked by the feared situation (s) interfere sharply with the person’s normal routine, with work (or academic) or social relationships, or provoke a clinically significant discomfort.

  • In those under 18 years, the duration of these symptoms must have been at least 6 months.

  • Anxiety, panic attacks, or phobic avoidance behaviors associated with specific objects or situations can not be better explained by the presence of another mental disorder, for example, an obsessive-compulsive disorder (eg, fear of an individual with obsessive ideas of contamination), post-traumatic stress disorder (eg, avoidance of stimuli related to a highly stressful event), separation anxiety disorder (eg, avoidance of going to school), phobia social (eg, avoidance of social situations for fear of embarrassment), anguish disorder with agoraphobia, or agoraphobia without a history of distress disorder.

Etiology

It can originate both from direct aversive experiences, that is unpleasant experiences on the plane, such as dizziness, nausea, turbulence or among others, on the other hand, it can appear by visual learning or by transmitting information from a father to a son, friends or close links. It is not associated with a clear trigger and there is also no evidence of biological factors in the etiology.