If you read The Atavism regularily you may have gathered I’m quite fond of spiders (1, 2). So, by and large I’m with the Bug Chicks when if comes to arachnophobia. -No spiders will go out of there way to attack people and there’s only a handful of species with toxin that packs any punch to humans so, rationally, there is really nothing to worry about. In keeping with that policy, when this handsome Cambridgea male turned up in our bathroom I saw it as a photo opportunity.
Then he ran cross my camera, up my arm and lodged himself at home on my neck. All my affection for spiders and rationality with regards to the risks lasted about a tenth of a second. I didn’t actually scream but it’s fair to say my heart rate was somewhat elevated and my movements were restricted. But why? What is is about spiders that freaks us out so much? I did a bit of digging through the academic databases but psychology really isn’t my science and I couldn’t get a clear idea. Researchers in Germany* have shown (at least among German undergraduate students) spiders do have a special place in our fears – people are more likely to respond badly to photos of spiders than other arthropods, even hymenopterans which can prose a more serious threat to people than spiders. But the question of why remains. Evolutionary psychologists have suggested arachnophobia might be an adaptation but it’s hard to imagine that selective pressure applied by occasional spider bites would be sufficient to drive a specific fear of them. Perhaps lots of spiny legs, beady eyes and fearsome fangs just set off enough triggers in the brain to elicit a unique response (did I mention psychology’s not my science…).
I remember reading a more plausible (and even testable) idea about the origin of arachnophobia in one of Steven Pinker’s books that didn’t pop up in my search of the literature. I don’t have the book in front of me (and I can’t even remember which one it was, although it sounds like a Blank Slate kind of an idea) so you might want to take this with even more grains of salt than you usually would with adaptationist ideas. From memory the argument went that we may be born with a general fear of all spiders and snakes but, until recently, would have learnt the few that are actually dangerous in the area we grew up in from our families. With the good guys and the bad guys separated we could stop wasting our energies on being worried by the overwhelming majority of species which are benign. An inbuilt arachnophobia with inbuilt malleability to surroundings. In the West we aren’t exposed to many spiders of any sort in our youth so we retain the childish arachnophobia all our lives. It’s a nice story whether it’s true or not doesn’t seem to have been tested.
Oh, and if my photo of a Cambridgea didn’t put you off Te Ara has a much scarier one.
*Spiders are special: fear and disgust evoked by pictures of arthropods. Antje B.M. Gerdes, Gabriele Uhl, Georg W. Alpers. Evolution and Human Behavior, DOI: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2008.08.005)
Heh, I’ve got some scarier photos also.
It does puzzle me that people are commonly afraid of spiders. I’m not sure why we would have any fear of a creature so small that well, we could crush it like a bug. Crocodiles seem a far more reasonable fear.
Some of it does seem to be learned. At pre-schools I’ve noticed that a lot of mothers communicate a fear of spiders to youngsters (they’re dirty & dangerous & something to be feared). We never treated spiders as fearful (just another interesting animal) around our children and as a consequence, they also have no fear. My daughter in fact, happily removes them from classrooms (’cos even most of the boys have this fear).
I think general poll data on animals also puts spiders well ahead of other creatures as common fears. Could it just be a meme we communicate through culture or do you think there really are evolutionary reasons for this fear?