What Is Arachnophobia? (An Overview)

In this blog we will discuss the symptoms, causes and treatment of Arachnophobia.

An intense fear of spiders is called Arachnophobia. It is one of the most common specific phobias, which comes under the category of anxiety disorders in the DSM-V.

Someone suffering from it will experience extreme anxiety when exposed to spiders.

A mere thought of encountering spiders can instigate very high levels of anxiety. One can even undergo full-blown panic attacks as a result.

Arachnophobia is not wholly irrational because spiders can be threatening to one’s life.

For example, the black widow spider is one of the deadliest spiders. It can cause poisoning to one, which is fatal. Thus, the fear of spiders is justified.

However, someone suffering from Arachnophobia will get extremely traumatized at the mere sight/thought of spiders.

The excessively recurrent, intrusive thoughts one has are the reason why the body produces physiological responses that intensifies one’s fear, such as fainting.

To eliminate these unpleasant feelings, one tends to avoid his fear stimuli, spiders.

These acts of avoidance maintain one’s fear by making them feel nice in the absence of spiders. This proves to them that spiders are to be feared of.

Thus, avoidance is repetitive, which may lead to one developing OCD in the future.

According to the DSM-V, someone suffering from Arachnophobia must experience anxiety lasting for at least 6-months and this anxiety should affect one’s social and occupational functioning.

For example, one might have to leave their house and move someplace else because of the fear of encountering spiders.

A sufferer living near a garden has a higher chance of getting exposed to spiders.

They may need to leave their family and live independently. Thus, their social relations are affected.

A child might even avoid attending school if they encountered spiders in their classroom or school.

Likewise, one can leave his job if he’s afraid of encountering his fear stimuli in his office. This affects one’s career or academic life.

This occupational dysfunction can cause one to develop depression as a result of his inability to live a normal life or earn a good living for their family.

Arachnophobia is an irrational fear of spiders. The name originates from the Greek word ‘arachne’ meaning spider and ‘phobos’ meaning fear.

People who ask Why am i so paranoid about spiders? are confused whether it’s because they have Arachnophobia or because they have paranoia.

Symptoms of Arachnophobia

People with Arachnophobia, like in all other specific phobias, experience intense anxiety on having an encounter with spiders.

They’re unable to control this anxiety and thus end up feeling more anxious. This anxiety, in extreme cases, can give rise to full-blown panic attacks.

Sufferers go into flight or fight mode because of an adrenaline rush. In this state, the body’s physiological responses help one make decisions when in fear causing situations.

They either decide to escape the situation (flight) or stay and combat their fear (fight).

In the case of Arachnophobia or any other type of specific phobia, the physiological symptoms that are produced when exposed to spiders (including extreme anxiety) cause the person to escape or avoid that situation.

Sufferers don’t have the courage to fight with their fear because of the unpleasant, terrifying experience the body goes through.

Apart from anxiety, Arachnophobia has a number of other physiological symptoms which include:

Extreme anxiety when exposed to spiders
Extreme anxiety by just thinking about spiders
Avoiding spiders
Full-blown panic attacks
Inability to handle anxiety
Muscle tension
Increased heartbeat
Breathlessness
Feelings of dizziness
Screaming or crying
Hot/cold flashes when in a flight or fight mode (A hot flash refers to the temporary heating up of the body when in a state of fear. And a cold flash means when the body suddenly starts to shiver or cool down, when encountered by a fear stimulus).
Migraine
Nausea
Upset stomach

Out of these, one should have at least 3-5 symptoms (including anxiety) to be diagnosed with Arachnophobia.

Causes of Arachnophobia

Like every other specific phobia, Arachnophobia is a result of either genetics or a past traumatic experience.

Someone who has a family history of anxiety disorders or specific phobias has a higher chance of developing Arachnophobia than someone who doesn’t.

This is because they are genetically predisposed to develop it.

This genetic tendency to develop a mental disorder/specific phobia can also be referred to as a Diathesis-stress relationship.

According to this, one with a genetic predisposition will not develop symptoms of Arachnophobia until and unless there is some trigger event, instigating anxiety or fear of spiders.

This triggering event can be for example, coming in contact with a spider in childhood. The sufferer might have developed this fear since then because of the disgusting or unpleasant feelings it caused.

Also, he might be fearful of developing an allergy or other health problems because of the itching sensations it produces or when in contact with it.

Also, watching documentaries on spiders can be the reason for one to develop Arachnophobia.

Someone might be fearful of spiders because of the news coverage/reports on poisoning caused by spiders like Wolf spiders.

They might have heard/saw someone suffer from pain or poisoning caused by a spider.

Or, one might have been punished as children, locked in rooms where they encountered spiders, thus associated spiders with this unpleasant childhood memory.

Another example of an environmental cause can be, learning to be afraid of spiders by looking at parents.

It is possible that someone whose parents are afraid of spiders can induce fear in the person.

Even movies, cartoons and or books have created a hype about spiders, which is negative. They are portrayed as evil, harmful insects. Thus, Arachnophobia can be developed as a result.

Therefore, it is evident that there is no one cause for specific phobias to develop.

Genetics with environmental factors, together will cause one to have Arachnophobia.

Treatment of Arachnophobia

Arachnophobia, like all other specific phobias, has no exclusive type of treatment that is specifically designed to treat it.

Like all the other specific phobias, Arachnophobia is treated by a number of different therapies including, Exposure Therapy, Cognitive-behavioral Therapy (CBT) and or medications that lower downs the anxiety or other physical symptoms.

• Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

It is one of the most frequently used treatments for patients with almost all kinds of mental disorders.

Arachnophobia is defined as the irrational fear of spiders. Thus, the therapist helps the patient in replacing these irrational thoughts with more rational ones.

The patients are helped out in analyzing and justifying the way they feel about being exposed to spiders.

Therapists assist them in uncovering the reasons behind their fear and later they provide them with alternate, pleasant thoughts.

The patient is told to maintain a thought diary (with ABCD column) which provides them a replacement for every irrational thought they have, when thinking about a particular situation.

The ABCD stands for:

i. A (antecedents) a situation or triggering event.

ii. B (belief) the thought that comes to one’s mind when in that triggering situation.

iii. C (consequences) the symptoms/feelings caused by that event/thought

iv. D (dispute) alternate, rational thoughts provided by the therapist in an attempt to dispute/challenge those irrational beliefs.

This last section of the thought diary is what really plays a role in helping the person feel good/less anxious.

• Exposure Therapy

It is one of the most frequently used ways of treating patients with Arachnophobia (or any other kind of specific phobia).

In this therapy, the patient is exposed to the source of his fear over a certain span of time.

To begin with the therapy, the therapist exposes the patient to the least triggering stimuli, a picture of a spider for example.

As the therapy progresses and the patient is able to control his anxious feelings, imagery can be used to take the treatment a step further.

In this part of the treatment the patient is asked to visualize/imagine a situation in which he sees or encounters a spider.

During this process of imagery, one actually feels being in that particular situation or place, experiencing various senses.

Once the person successfully, without feeling anxious clears this step of the therapy, he is then exposed to real spiders.

While the patient is being exposed to different intensities of stimuli during the various stages of therapy, the therapist simultaneously teaches them coping exercises.

These include, breathing techniques or muscle relaxation methods to lower their anxiety, when in an actual fear/anxiety causing situation. This teaches them how to remain calm when exposed to the fear stimuli.

Before actually starting the exposure therapy, the therapist needs to figure out the intensity of the patient’s fear, as to deduce whether they will be able to undergo this treatment, without any physical or psychological harm caused to them during the exposure processes.

However, these steps desensitize one to their fear of spiders by exposing them to that stimuli repeatedly, until they learn to undergo the situation without anxiety/panic attacks.

• Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)

This is another effective therapy used to treat Arachnophobia.

It is more commonly used with people suffering from personality disorders, but is also useful with patients of this ‘animal’ specific phobia.

Coping skills are taught in the DBT group which lasts for about 6 months and can have a number of people (depending on how many join the group).

i. Half-smiling is the first module of DBT. It is a technique that is used with patients who are distressed because of their irrational thoughts.

The technique is known as ‘Half-smiling’ because the person is first advised to think about the stimuli that fears or upsets them, and while doing so they are told to lift the corners of their mouths by subtly smiling.

Smiling is not that will help one get rid of these unpleasant thoughts, it is the person’s ability to constrain itself from thinking about those thoughts while half smiling.

ii. Mindfulness, the second module, is another technique used in DBT groups which helps the individual in getting rid of those negative thoughts.

Individuals are told to focus on the present and be attentive to what is going on around them at the moment. This helps in breaking the link between their mind and any negative thought that might come to them then.

For example, a person is told to focus on his breath or on the sound of the blowing wind, making use of their auditory sense.

iii. The third technique or module of the DBT is distress tolerance skills. This module teaches people to calm themselves down in healthy ways when they are distressed or emotionally overwhelmed.

Individuals are allowed to make wise, rational decisions and take immediate action, rather than being captured by emotionally destructive thoughts that might make the situation worse.

Reality acceptance skills are also learnt under this model so that people fully accept reality and later make plans on how to address the problem/fearful aspects to it.

• Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)

MBSR is a meditation therapy, used to manage stress or anxiety. It is an 8-week program which includes group sessions.

Mindfulness meditation and Hatha yoga are practiced in these sessions. Lectures and group discussions are also done to talk about mental health and increase interactivity.

In mindfulness meditation the person is told to, for example, to focus on the sensations felt while breathing or the rhythm of the chest rising and falling during the process.

This distracts the person’s attention from something stressful to something which is neutral and soothing.

For quick and effective treatment, patients are also given a set of home works, for example 45 minutes of yoga and meditation sessions for 6 days a week and to record their results/feelings in a book or diary for 15 minutes a day.

• Drug Therapy

Drugs are used to reduce the physical symptoms caused by Arachnophobia. Drugs are very quick in effectiveness, as they start showing progress in the patients’ health at least 2 weeks after the medicine is taken.

This type of biological treatment is usually more effective if the cause of the phobia is only genetic.

However, these drugs/medicines are not to be taken without a doctor’s prescription or consultation.

Two types of drugs are used in the treatment of this phobia:

i. Anti-anxiety Drugs

Medicines like Valium are anti-anxiety drugs.

They are most commonly used with patients who experience panic attacks and also lowers their anxiety by binding to receptor cells of the brain that cause these unpleasant symptoms.

ii.Antidepressant Drugs

These drugs, as the name suggests don’t only treat depression but are also very effective in treating phobias.

Medicines like Lexapro reduce the anxious feelings of a person and makes him feel calm. They need to be taken on a daily basis but not without a doctor’s advice.

Whether the cause of Arachnophobia, or any other type of specific phobia is genetics, environmental or both, the best and the most effective way of treating them is by using a combination of both biological treatments (drugs) with cognitive treatment (for example CBT/exposure therapy).