More often than not, people have something that scares them. In some cases, their fear could even be called a phobia. Having a phobia is not exactly uncommon, which is why students expressed having many phobias.

In a survey of 115 people, 46.1 percent of people said that their worst phobia is Arachnophobia, which is the fear of spiders. This is not an uncommon phobia either. Many students strongly detest spiders. “I think the reason why most people don’t like them is because they can be so small, so you never know where they are. But at the same time, they’re pretty nasty,” said Anna Meyer (‘21).

Another phobia from the survey that was much less common was Hydrophobia, the fear of water, with only 6.1 percent of respondents claiming it as one of their phobias. The students who claimed this phobia have lots to say on where their fear may have come from. “My fear of water probably came from the lack of control people have when falling into things such as those,” said Alexis Mette (‘21).

On a scale of one to five, one being barely affected and five being extremely affected, 38.3 percent of students at Holt High School rated their phobias a three. Only 17.4 percent rated their phobias a five and 9.6 percent rated their phobias a one.

Acrophobia, the fear of heights, is a very common phobia and 35.7 percent of students at school seem to be affected by this phobia. Some do not know where this phobia stems

from, but others do. “I’ve seen videos of people falling off of high places and getting seriously

injured,” said Austin Bell (‘20).

Many students also suffer from Claustrophobia, the fear of small and enclosed spaces. Although it is another common phobia, the reasons people suffer from this phobia differ. “Claustrophobia stems from being locked in a closet when I was younger,” said Brenden Clark (‘19).

One of the more interesting phobias in the survey was Submechanophobia, which is the fear of man-made objects underwater. Although not many students who have surveyed experience this phobia, the ones who do had much to say about where they felt their phobia came from. “The worst one is when I saw a movie where a guy dove into a pool full of dark water on a dare and it turned out to be a housing pool for machinery used for electricity generating and it turned on while he was in it and he got all ground up,” said Ruth-Ann King (‘21).

Although phobias are terrifying when you are in the moment, it can be fun to look into why people may suffer from these phobias or how badly they affect someone. Reasons differ from person to person. It is interesting to look at because everyone really is different.