Acrophobia

Acrophobia is the fear people experience when they are exposed to great heights. Please note that vertigo is not the fear of heights, but rather the fear of falling.

Acrophobia (from Greek meaning "summit") is an extreme or irrational fear of heights. It belongs to a category of specific phobias, called space and motion discomfort that share both similar etymology and options for treatment.

Acrophobia can be dangerous, as sufferers can experience a panic attack in a high place and become too agitated to get themselves down safely. Some acrophobics also suffer from urges to throw themselves off high places, despite not being suicidal.

'Vertigo' is often used, incorrectly, to describe the fear of heights, but it is more accurately described as a spinning sensation, which may be caused by looking down from a high place, as well as by some other stimuli.

Causes of acrophobia

Traditionally, acrophobia has been attributed, like other irrational fears, to conditioning or a past traumatic experience involving heights. Recent studies have cast doubt on this explanation; fear of falling, along with fear of loud noises, is one of the most commonly suggested inborn or non-associative fears. The newer non-association theory is that fear of heights is an evolved adaptation to a prehistory where falls posed a significant danger. The degree of fear varies and the term phobia is reserved for those at the extreme end of the spectrum.

This extreme fear can be counter-productive in normal everyday life though, with some sufferers being afraid to go up a flight of stairs or a ladder, or to stand on a chair, table, etc.

Another possible contributing factor is dysfunction in maintaining balance. In this case the anxiety is both well founded and secondary. According to the dysfunction model, a normal person uses both vestibular and visual cues appropriately in maintaining balance. An acrophobic over relies on visual signals either because of inadequate vestibular function or incorrect strategy. Locomotion at a high elevation requires more than normal visual processing. The visual cortex becomes overloaded resulting in confusion. Some proponents of the alternative view of acrophobia warn that it may be ill-advised to encourage acrophobics to expose themselves to height without first resolving their vestibular issues. Research is underway at several clinics.

This interference can often include the avoidance of: tall buildings, climbing on ladders, traveling on mountain roads, taking amusement rides, and other various encounters with high places. Treatments for this condition are often successful and include repetitive encounters with progressively more challenging high places. A typical patient with this condition is guided through a series of prolonged encounters with high places that are initially mildly anxiety-provoking and finally working up to those which are extremely difficult. This sort of treatment is called Behavioral Exposure Therapy.

STEPHEN WRIGHT: "A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me. I'm afraid of widths."

GEORGE NEGUS: "Another very common fear, of course, is the fear of heights, which makes a lot of sense. After all, we weren't exactly designed to fly. But often, a fear of heights can become an irrational obsession, so bad that many sufferers are too frightened to even use an escalator in a shopping centre."