Evolutionary psychologists suggest that phobias are adaptive behaviors that helped our ancestors survive
Seligman (1971) - suggested humans are biologically prepared to fear certain animals, says fear is not necessarily triggered by any traumatic experience e.g. fearing a lion despite never seeing one before
Mineka et al (1980) - conducted piece of research using wild-reared & lab-reared monkeys & found wild-reared monkeys showed considerable amount of fear to real & toy snakes but lab-reared monkeys only showed mild fear. Bennett-levy and Marteau tested this again & found lab-reared moneys showed a lot of fear to snake movements (B-L&M conclude we have a prepared template not to fear snakes but to fear snake like movement)
Hinde (1974) - suggested certain characteristics evoke a fear response, B-L&M found this is true when they treated phobia patients & noticed patients' description of what they feared most focused greatly on what the animal looks and feels like
Aims: Bennett-levy and Marteau aimed to investigate whether we are biologically prepared to fear certain stimulus configuration in animals such as rapid movement and their differences from the human form
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