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Acrophobia!

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Acrophobia

Acrophobia (from Greek, meaning "summit") is an extreme or irrational fear of heights. It belongs to a category of specific phobias, called space and motion discomfort that share both similar etiology and options for treatment.

Acrophobia can be dangerous, as sufferers can experience a panic attack in a high place and become too agitated to get themselves down safely. Some acrophobics also suffer from urges to throw themselves off high places, despite not being suicidal.

"Vertigo" is often used, incorrectly, to describe the fear of heights, but it is more accurately described as a spinning sensation, which may be caused by looking down from a high place, as well as by some other stimuli.

Causes of acrophobia

Traditionally, acrophobia has been attributed, like other irrational fears, to conditioning or a traumatic experience involving heights. Recent studies have cast doubt on this explanation; fear of falling, along with fear of loud noises, is one of the most commonly suggested inborn or non-associative fears. The newer non-association theory is that fear of heights is an evolved adaptation to a prehistory where falls posed a significant danger. The degree of fear varies and the term phobia is reserved for those at the extreme end of the spectrum.

This extreme fear can be counter-productive in normal everyday life though, with some sufferers being afraid to go up a flight of stairs or a ladder, or to stand on a chair, table, (etc.).

Another possible contributing factor is dysfunction in maintaining balance. In this case the anxiety is both well founded and secondary. According to the dysfunction model, a normal person uses both vestibular and visual cues appropriately in maintaining balance. An acrophobic overrelies on visual signals whether because of inadequate vestibular function or incorrect strategy. Locomotion at a high elevation requires more than normal visual processing. The visual cortex becomes overloaded resulting in confusion. Some proponents of the alternative view of acrophobia warn that it may be ill-advised to encourage acrophobics to expose themselves to height without first resolving the vestibular issues. Research is underway at several clinics.

Acrophobia Popular culture

Vertigo a film by Alfred Hitchcock in which detective John "Scottie" Ferguson (James Stewart), a police officer, feels vertigo and becomes acrophobic after losing his partner in a high fall.

Monk Adrian Monk has acrophobia.

High Anxiety a spoof by Mel Brooks in which the main character, a leading psychiatrist, is acrophobic, but throughout the film the disorder is medically referred to as "high anxiety"

In The Muppet Christmas Carol, Rizzo the Rat claims that he is acrophobic.

Bill Engvall has acrophobic

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