Arachnophobia is explained by an evolutionary strategy to avoid contact with pathogens
Researchers from Charles University in Prague have identified the hidden cause of arachnophobia – an obsessive and uncontrollable fear of spiders, writes the Daily Mail.
Arachnophobia is one of the most common phobias in the world, affecting 2.7 to 6.1 percent of the world’s population. There are no objective reasons for it – most spiders are harmless to humans, with only 0.5 percent of species capable of causing harm.
The authors of the present study believe that in fact behind the fear of spiders lies the fear of scorpions, which belong to the same subtype of chelicerae. Scorpios, unlike spiders, actively attack humans. One and a half million bites are registered in the world every year, 2600 of which are fatal.
The study involved 329 volunteers who had to evaluate their experiences with live specimens of 62 arthropod species, including cockroaches, scorpions and spiders. Participants shared whether these creatures arouse fear and disgust in them or find them beautiful.
Spiders, scorpions and other arachnids received the highest score on fear and disgust. At the same time, the beetles were rated as beautiful by most participants in the experiment. Scientists have noticed that the bigger the animal, the more vivid emotions (positive or negative) it evokes.
The study also showed that people tend to unite in their perception of all chelicerae – spiders, scorpions, ticks and many other species, while insects and crabs are perceived as a separate group. It turns out that many people consider cockroaches ugly, but at the same time they do not cause fear in them.
“We hypothesize that the fear of spiders may be caused by a more general fear of chelicerae, with scorpions being the starting model I’m afraid of,” the researchers wrote.
According to another theory, fear of spiders is part of an evolutionary strategy to avoid contact with pathogens, parasites and other possible sources of disease.
