Emetophobia is a type of fear. The word comes from the Greek ’emesis’ (vomiting), while the suffix -phobia means an illogical, debilitating fear of an object or situation. People who suffer from this condition are called emetophobes, which means that they have anxieties over being exposed to vomit, or witnessing someone vomit (even on a photo or on television).
Emetophobia treatment can be found, but science has yet given a good explanation of this disorder. Usually the fear of vomit itself is subdued to the extended, more general fear of anything that could be somehow related to vomit – such as simply being in a situation where such a threat exists, and being afraid of being sick in general.
Emetophobia is the overly general fear of the threat of vomiting in a wide variety of situations that causes the most problems to sufferers. Many emetophobes cannot eat out, and won’t eat food where they haven’t had any control over the cooking process.
The disorder commonly develops as a result of going through a long or violent bout of vomiting, or being exposed to someone else vomiting severely with a regularity. This might have been due to illness or pregnancy in their mother.
Or if the child had a tendency for self-stimulated vomiting that leads to an increased risk. Going through gastrointestinal surgery is yet another risk factor.
And sometimes another underlying mental health condition might be the cause. Whatever causes it, it can indeed be cured and some methods have been shown to be effective. So emetophobia treatment can be found on the market.
There is a famous study by Angela L. Davidson who found that individuals with emetophobia have a higher than average level of perceived internal control over their everyday lives – this is called an internal locus of control. The LOC – locus of control means where the person thinks control comes from.
An internal LOC shows that the individual perceives control over a particular situation to be in their hands, while an external locus of control means that things are out of their control, perhaps in luck or fate. It’s important to keep in mind that people can be somewhere in between as well in this scale.
If you want to read about effective methods for treatment of emetophobia that have been shown to work, then go here now: Emetophobia. This is published on our website: Emetophobia.