Fear of fish or ichthyophobia ranges from cultural phenomena such as fear of eating fish, fear of touching raw fish, or fear of dead fish, up to irrational fear (specific phobia). Selachophobia, or galeophobia, is the specific fear of sharks.Galeophobia in medical dictionary.
Etymology The term ichthyophobia comes from the Greek ἰχθῦς - ichthus, meaning "fish"ἰχθῦς, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus and φόβος - phobos, "fear".φόβος, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Galeophobia comes from the Greek γαλεός - galeos, "small shark".γαλεός, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus
Phobia Ichthyophobia is described in Psychology: An International Perspective as an "unusual" specific phobia.Michael W. Eysenck. Psychology: An International Perspective, Psychology Press, 2004, p839, Both symptoms and remedies of ichthyophobia are common to most specific phobias.
American psychologist John B. Watson, a renowned name in behaviorism, describes an example, quoted in many books in psychology, of conditioned fear of a goldfish in an infant and a way of unconditioning of the fear by what is now called graduated exposure therapy:John B. Watson (1929) "Behaviorism - The Modern Note in Psychology"
In contrast, radical exposure therapy was used successfully to cure a man with a "life affecting" fish phobia on the 2007 documentary series, The Panic Room.Tryst Williams. Man cured of 'life affecting' fish phobia. Western Mail, 18 April 2007
Cultural phenomenon Historically, the Navajo people were described as being ichthyophobic,Washington Matthews. Ichthyophobia, The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 11, No. 41 (1898), pp. 105-112William H. Lyon. The Navajos in the American Historical Imagination, 1868-1900, Ethnohistory, Vol. 45, No. 2 (1998), pp. 237-275 due to their aversion to fish. However, this was later recognised as a cultural or mythic aversion to aquatic animals,Howard M. Bahr. The Navajo as Seen by the Franciscans, 1898-1921: A Sourcebook. Scarecrow Press, 2004, and not a psychological condition.
Fear of eating fish The Journal of the American Medical Association have published a research paperDariush Mozaffarian, Eric B. Rimm, "Fish Intake, Contaminants, and Human Health. Evaluating the Risks and the Benefits", Journal of the American Medical Association, 2006, vol. 296, pp 1885-1899. "New Study Shows the Benefits of Eating Fish Greatly Outweigh the Risks" - an overview of the publication by Mozaffarian and Rimm in a press release by the Harvard School of Public Health addressing the fears of eating fish"Time-Tested Guidelines for Eating Seafood" , a presentation by Jane Brody (Personal Health Columnist, The New York Times) at the 2005 Seafood & Health Conference, where she coined her own term for fear of fish: pescaphobia, from Latin for "fish" among those who are concerned about contaminants, such as mercury, becoming accumulated in their food.
See also
List of phobias
References