What is fear of the dark? Is this normal?

The alternation of day and night in spring, summer, autumn and winter is a very normal natural phenomenon, but many people cannot accept it because they are afraid of the coming of night. Staying in a dark space often makes them tremble with fear or even cry, which makes people around them very puzzling. So what exactly is fear of the dark? In fact, fear of the dark is nymphophobia.

Achyranthesophobia is a psychological disorder characterized by fear of the dark and fear of being alone. The mental symptoms and emotions vary greatly during the day and at night. The fear of darkness is mainly caused by the negative emotions caused by not trusting oneself and being afraid of life. The degree of negative emotions depends on the severity of the individual's fear of darkness.

Manifestation

Generally at night, when people are alone, they will experience inexplicable panic, insecurity, tension and fear, and negative emotions; this symptom is indirect and continuous; some people will experience this emotion because something bad has happened, while some people will experience this emotion once it is night and there is no one around them, and they will feel negative, afraid, and even have many inexplicable thoughts.

Diagnostic criteria

In CCMD-3, the diagnostic criteria for phobias are as follows:

1) Meet the diagnostic criteria for neurosis;

2) Fear is the main factor, which must meet the following four items: having an intense fear of certain objects or situations, the degree of fear is disproportionate to the actual danger; having anxiety and autonomic nervous system symptoms during the attack; having repeated or persistent avoidance behavior; knowing that the fear is excessive, unreasonable, or unnecessary, but unable to control it;

3) avoidance of feared situations and objects must be or have been a prominent symptom;

4) Rule out anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, and hypochondriasis.

If your fear goes beyond the normal fear and you develop a conditioned reflex to darkness, and you feel fear whenever you are in such an environment, then this does not fall into the category of normal fear. From a psychological perspective, this is a kind of obsessive-compulsive disorder. The fear of the dark is more specifically compulsive thinking. As long as the patient is in a certain environment, a certain situation will be caused by conditioned reflex, and the thinking will be uncontrollable, and he will think about those things unconsciously. Only when the above four criteria are met and obsessive thoughts or compulsive behaviors occur can a person be diagnosed with nyctophobia.