Got any phobias? Arachnophobia (fear of spiders), maybe, or galeophobia (fear of sharks)? Or how about trypophobia — fear of holes?
Whatever your phobia, there's almost certainly a name for it, and you're not the only one who experiences it. ProWritingAid gathered the data on the most prevalent phobias in every state and put 'em on a map. (If you are afraid of maps, by the way, you could say you have cartographobia.)
Key takeaways:
- The most common fear by state is the fear of holes (trypophobia), followed by — in the top five — fear of water (aquaphobia), needles (trypanophobia), death (thanatophobia) and crowded places (agoraphobia).
- The five least common fears, cropping up as the most common fear in just one state each, are fear of the dark (nyctophobia), clowns (coulrophobia), snakes (ophidiophobia), heights (acrophobia) and small spaces (claustrophobia).
- A couple fears you may not have heard of that appear on the map are the fear of large objects (megalophobia), in California, Michigan, New York and North Carolina; and the fear of being stared at (scoptophobia), in Pennsylvania, Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin.
Here's the full map — click to expand the image and see it in more detail.
[Source: ProWritingAid.com]