This Halloween, it's time to face your fears! More specifically, it's an opportunity to learn about how our brains process fear, as well as explore why we have phobias and how we can deal with them.

The Facts on Phobias

Generally, phobias are classified into three different types:

1. Specific phobias: Phobias that involve a certain animal, person, object, situation, or activity. Ophidiophobia (fear of snakes) and astraphobia (fear of thunderstorms) are two examples.
2. Social anxiety disorder (formerly known as "social phobias"): A fear of social situations, be they tied to a performance (such as giving a speech) or another type of social interaction.
3. Agoraphobia: A fear of being in a place or situation which could be difficult or embarrassing to leave.

A phobia is much more extreme than a fear. As noted in this article by BrainFacts.org, clinically diagnosed phobias cause a person to experience intense physical or mental anxiety, to specifically avoid situations that involve the phobia, and to suffer personally or professionally due to the intensity of the phobia.

For example, you may jump or scream when a spider unexpectedly skitters out from under a leaf. But if you then believe that under every leaf lurks a spider, and the mere thought of encountering another spider causes you to break into a cold sweat and never leave your home again, you likely have a phobia rather than a simple fear. (Arachnophobia, to be specific!)

Your Brain on Fear

When we encounter something scary, a part of our brain called the amygdala lights up. It's believed that the amygdala plays a key role in identifying threats and initiating a "fight or flight" response in the split second that it takes to process our sensory inputs.

More recent research on the amygdala has shown that it does more than just warn of danger, though. It appears to be an important part of our ability to form positive and negative connections to stimuli, as well as memories that involve strong emotions.

Born This Way?

Phobias aren't usually rational, although there is evidence to suggest that a number of phobias have an evolutionary basis, meaning that we're born with some degree of fear.

This article from Neuroscientifically Challenged covers a study that involved showing infants pictures of a range of subjects, including spiders. The infants held their gaze on the spiders notably longer than on the other images, suggesting an innate predisposition to seeing a spider as something worth paying a bit closer attention to and watching out for.

Because phobias of spiders and snakes are so common, it's thought that a fear of these animals actually came about due to many of them being venomous. Logically, it makes sense that the ancient humans who avoided deadly critters were the ones to pass on their genes. It's not just humans who can recognize a venomous threat, either. Some birds, for example, appear to be born with an innate fear of venomous snakes and spiders. The same may be true of us!

Fighting Phobias

Phobias are deep-seated fears, which means that they're not something you can simply "get over" by choice. With the help of a psychologist, those suffering from phobias can use cognitive behavioral therapy (which involves guided, intentional thinking through the fear) and exposure therapy (which involves either imagined or real-life exposure to the fear in a controlled environment) to hopefully find reprieve.

Recently, therapists have been experimenting with using virtual reality to mitigate certain phobias, such as heights (acrophobia) and public speaking (glossophobia). One benefit of virtual reality is that therapists have more control over the fine details. They can create a controlled environment or even a customized scenario designed specifically to address a patient's fear.

As neuroscientists learn more about the origins and mechanics of phobias, and as therapy technologies evolve, we hope that it only becomes easier to face our fears in the future. (Especially if you have phobophobia—a fear of phobias!)