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Blog - Phobias

Forget about insectophobia with VIRTUAL REALITY

By Nikolas Andreev, Chief Marketing Officer at PsyTech VR
July 25, 2022

Insecto-, Acaro-, Entomophobia

Insecto-, Acaro-, Entomophobia

Hello everyone! Today our team will tell you about insectophobia, often referred to as acarophobia or entomophobia. People with this kind of phobia have extreme anxiety or fear when seeing or thinking about insects - ants, bees, arachnids, cockroaches, dragonflies, or even ladybugs. People avoid life circumstances where it is possible to face those creatures - walking in the forest, exercising in the basement - and prefer to stay away from outdoor events.
It’s hard to know exactly how many people around the world have a fear of insects. Many people may keep this fear to themselves or may not recognise they have it.

While visiting the countryside, some people may choose not to leave their house to reduce the chances of seeing insects. Anything related to insects may bring on entomophobia, this phobia can be triggered by seeing or thinking about insects: in public spaces like parks, playgrounds, or sidewalks; inside your or someone else’s house; TV shows, movies, books, or online.

Why do people become terrified of insects?

No wonder there is an expression: "We all come from childhood." Often, insectophobia has its roots in early childhood: an irrational fear of insects can be experienced by a person who, for example, once saw a wasp stung by a loved one on the eve of death, subconsciously linking these two events. An unsuccessful joke of a classmate who put a spider in a pouch can be the beginning of the development of arachnophobia. In psychiatry, there is such a thing as modeling - for example, if the mother of a child is afraid of insects. A violent reaction accompanies their every appearance on her part; the baby may also begin to experience fear of them: according to the principle, “since they scare mom like that, then And they are a danger to me."


In each case, only a specialist can identify the prerequisites for the occurrence of a phobia.

In addition to them, psychotherapists distinguish the so-called "Far-fetched" reasons - for example, a person is afraid that insects can get into his ear, nose, stomach, and brain, not perceiving any reasonable arguments about this impossibility.

Someone is not able to explain why the insect causes such intense fear. Many patients are simply afraid of the appearance of insects.

Treatment

Treatment

Patients with an irrational fear of certain insects do not often seek medical help. Some believe this is unnecessary - it is enough just not to meet the object of your anxiety. Others are ashamed to admit that they experience panic horror while facing a harmless ant.

By and large, treatment is necessary for those patients whose behavior becomes dangerous for themselves. HOWEVER, WHERE IS THE LINE BETWEEN an intense fear of a spider with a desire to hide from it AND a decision to rub a poisonous agent into the skin so this “monster” couldn’t approach you?
Insectophobia can and should be treated.


Safe and proven solution

Safe and proven solution

Our team presents a unique method of dealing with phobias based on virtual reality technologies: We create safe locations for phobia training in which a person can immerse himself in the environment of dread by facing insects in VR. Our brain has a magic function of getting used to fear; periodic training is only required. And here comes PsyTech VR:
1) Learn education courses on the platform on how to train phobias in VR. Those courses are prepared with the help of a psychologist's team, based on 20+ years of counseling patients with phobias.
2) Immerse yourself in the virtual environment using a Meta Quest headset, and train in VR by following scripts written in the application. We’ll collect statistics and ask for your fear assessment to help you better understand the training results.
3) Discover real-time statistics on the platform, and view insights of training.
Screenshots demonstrate the alpha version of application
To dive into entomophobia, we’ve developed four virtual locations where a person encounters insects, for example, an apartment with crawling cockroaches, spider webs, and flies. All the levels are created with the “fear leader” method because facing the phobic person in dangerous situations is hazardous. You will be able to meet fears smoothly in order not to experience a heart attack and then go through more complex challenges.
You can train in VR using self-guiding courses from the comfort of your home

OR

with a specialist - the doctor will have access to your training in real-time and guide you through all the training!
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Nikolas Andreev
CMO at PsyTech VR

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