What causes arachnophobia?

What causes arachnophobia?

What causes arachnophobia isn’t fully understood. Researchers believe causes might include:

• A traumatic past experience with a spider.
• Childhood exposure to a parent’s arachnophobia. You may develop arachnophobia if you felt the anxieties of one of your parent’s reactions to spiders.
• Family history of anxiety disorders. This could increase your chance of developing a phobia, such as arachnophobia.

Technically, scientists believe neurochemicals overstimulate an area of your brain — your amygdala — in the presence of fear. There’s also thought that a single genetic mutation can increase your risk of arachnophobia if you have that gene defect.