Fear of insects (entomophobia): causes, symptoms and treatment

One of the most common phobias. We explain why we feel this aversion to insects.

There are many phobias, some of them are very common and others not so common. Among the most frequent we can find the fear of insects or entomophobia, which also receives the name of insectophobia.

If you are paralyzed by the sight of a cockroach scurrying around your living room, or you avoid traveling because you are obsessed with the idea that the hotel you are staying at is infested with bedbugs, you may suffer from this disorder.

In this article we will talk about the pathological fear of insects, and we will delve into its causes.and we will delve into its causes, symptoms and consequences.

What is entomophobia

Entomophobia is an irrational and persistent fear that manifests itself in the presence of insects, and can appear anywhere, whether camping in the mountains, walking in the park, jogging on the beach or visiting a rural house. This phobia, although it may seem ridiculous in some cases due to the harmlessness of some insects, creates great discomfort for the sufferer, who feels great anxiety and anguish and an exaggerated attempt to avoid the feared stimulus.

Although most insects are not harmful to humans and do not pose a threat, sufferers with this phobia experience extreme anxiety at the mere thought or observation of an insect. People with entomophobia may be embarrassed and aware of their fear, but are unable to cope with it and often require professional help to overcome it.

Any insect, be it spiders, wasps, butterflies, dragonflies or caterpillars, can become the stimulus that elicits a phobia.. However, the most common forms of entomophobia are bee phobia and spider phobia.

You can learn more about these phobias in our articles:

• Fear of bees (apiphobia): causes, symptoms and treatment.
• Arachnophobia: causes and symptoms of extreme fear of spiders

Causes of insect fear

To understand how a person develops this phobia, it is necessary to understand how a phobia develops in general. Because phobia is an irrational fear, it is not a real danger, and it is learned.

In most cases, phobics developed this pathology as a result of a traumatic experience. This occurs due to associative learning called classical conditioning. You can learn more in our article "Classical conditioning and its most important experiments".

But people do not necessarily have to experience phobias on their own skin; they can learn them by observation, in what is known as vicarious conditioning. In addition, some irrational beliefs may encourage the development of these pathologies.

Some experts suggest that phobias may also be due to the fact that the human body is biologically prepared to fear easily. This would be so because fears develop in the primitive part of the brain and not in the neocortex, the more rational part. This explains why phobias do not respond to logical arguments.

This can be understood because this type of behavior may have helped the human species to survive. But they can cause serious problems today by developing fears without any apparent risk..

Symptoms of this phobia

When a person suffers from this phobia and other individuals try to make him or her see reason regarding the non-dangerousness of an insect, these logical arguments do not help much, and the symptoms drastically affect the phobic's ability to live normally, these logical arguments do not help much, and the symptoms drastically affect the phobic's ability to live a normal life..

Like all phobias, entomophobia or insectophobia is a condition that must be taken seriously, because it can be disabling.. Symptoms affect the individual at cognitive, behavioral and physical levels. Among the first symptoms are fear, anguish, lack of concentration or catastrophic thoughts. As a behavioral symptom, it is characteristic the attempt to avoid the phobic stimulus. And as physical symptoms, the most common are the sensation of choking, hyperventilation, headache, Nausea or stomach pain.

Treatment of entomophobia

The classic treatment of phobias aims to break the stimulus-response association, so cognitive behavioral techniques, also known as second-wave behavior therapy, are used with some frequency. The therapist can help the patient to overcome the phobia using these techniques. The most common are relaxation and breathing techniques and exposure techniques..

But the technique most commonly used in this type of treatment is systematic desensitization, which includes the two previous ones and consists of gradually exposing the patient to the phobic stimulus. In other words, the patient can begin by being exposed to photographs of insects and later to real insects. This method also allows the patient to learn coping strategies, including relaxation and breathing techniques. Many patients have successfully completed a systematic desensitization program. If you want to know more about this technique, you can read our article: "What is systematic desensitization and how does it work?

Nowadays, other therapeutic methodologies such as Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and acceptance and commitment therapy can also be used.

In addition, with the development of new technologies, new ways of treating this pathology have appeared. An example of this is virtual reality, which has proven to be very effective in exposing the patient to phobic stimuli. On the other hand, apps have appeared for smartphones that include psychotherapeutic tools to treat these irrational fears..

• You can learn more in our article "8 apps to treat phobias and fears from your smartphone".