Fear of mirrors (catoptrophobia): causes and symptoms

There are many types of phobia of which we have spoken Psychology and Mind, some very rare or strange as is the case of the trypophobia. And it is that phobias share many symptoms in common and are quite frequent anxiety disorders.

All human beings can feel fear, which is an adaptive emotion that has allowed the human species to survive over the centuries. Now, this adaptive emotion can become a situation that produces great discomfort and even irrational terror in the face of some stimuli that are not dangerous at all.

In fact, one of these phobias is catoptrophobia or eisoptrophobia.. The irrational fear of something as everyday as looking in the mirror.

The fear of mirrors, what is it about?

Fear of mirrors or catoptrophobia It is a specific phobia that belongs to the group of anxiety disorders., since its characteristic symptom is the discomfort and great anxiety that people with phobia suffer. Within phobic disorders there are three groups: social phobia, agoraphobia or specific phobias. Regarding this last case. They appear in the presence of some objects or specific situations, such as spiders (

arachnophobia), flying by plane (aerophobia) or, in this case, the presence of mirrors or the fact of looking at oneself in them.

Phobias cause the person who suffers from them to try to avoid the feared situation or object and, for example, not go to places where you can encounter phobic stimuli, something that can alter your normality life. Perhaps in the case of fear of mirrors, this pathology rarely affects a person's life in a very negative way, except for the discomfort it causes, Unlike other phobias such as claustrophobia, the patient is unable to get on public transport to go to work, thus making their working life difficult And social.

However, It may happen that these people avoid, for example, going to their friends' houses so as not to have to face fear. It should not be forgotten that mirrors are fairly common objects, and discomfort can occur at any time, Unlike other phobias in which the person very rarely comes into contact with the phobic stimulus, such as snakes.

Sometimes, catoptrophobia can be confused with spectrophobia, which is the fear of the existence or appearance of ghosts or spirits, since people with this phobic disorder may be afraid of seeing their own reflection in the mirror and think that the figure can get out of said object.

What causes catoptrophobia?

Phobias can have different causes; however, most experts agree that irrational fears are learned. Until just a few decades ago, the belief was that phobias were genetically inherited, but this view changed as a result of investigations of classical conditioning, a type of associative learning that was originally discovered by a Russian physiologist named Ivan Pavlov.

This character intended to experiment with the saliva of dogs and that is why he brought them food. Well, dogs salivate when they are going to eat to facilitate the digestion process. Pavlov noticed that at first the dogs salivated in the presence of food, but after several trials, the mere presence of the investigator caused the dogs to salivate even without the food being present. This meant that the dogs had associated Pavlov's presence with food, and therefore the scientist elicited the response that originally elicited food alone.

Learning fear in humans

Pavlov's experiments were the beginning of a new paradigm in Psychology: Behaviorism.. But this current did not become popular until John B. Watson popularized it in the United States and, as a consequence, in the world. Watson experimented with a small child so that he was afraid of certain stimuli, that is, he caused a phobia This study is one of the most controversial in psychology, and is called the “Little Albert's experiment”.

In addition to this theory, another hypothesis that is being considered about the origin of phobias is that some stimuli are more prone to be learned because we are biologically prepared for it to avoid the disappearance of our species. For this reason, when we learn something, mechanisms are produced that have little to do with reason and logic, and for this reason it is difficult to overcome a phobia despite the fact that we are aware that the fear is irrational.

On the other hand, this phobia can develop due to superstition or false beliefs, since there is the popular belief that breaking a mirror means that bad luck will be with us for seven years.

Symptoms of catoptrophobia

The symptoms of the different types of phobias, whether specific or complex (social phobia and agoraphobia), are common among them. Anxiety is undoubtedly the most characteristic feature, which is accompanied by great discomfort and an attempt to avoid mirrors. The person can experience the phobia when he sees the mirrors or before the image of himself in the mirrors.

In general, there are three types of symptoms of catoptrophobia:

• cognitive symptoms: experience of fear, great anxiety or anguish. Avoidance thoughts.
• behavioral symptoms: perform behaviors of escape or avoidance of the stimulus.
• physical symptoms: accelerated pulse, tachycardia, headache, upset stomach, etc.

How to overcome this phobia

Fortunately, phobias have a cure, and psychological treatment works very well for this type of disorder. Since its origin is learned, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has proven to be effective and the prognosis for patient recovery is very good.

Within this type of therapy it is common to use some methods such as relaxation techniques or exposure techniques. A type of exposure technique widely used is systematic desensitization, which consists of exposing the patient gradually to the phobic stimulus while learning more coping strategies adaptive. For example, it is possible to start by showing the patient images of some mirrors, and at the end therapy he is able to take a mirror with his own hands and look at himself in it without any kind of fear.

Now, this type of therapy, which works so well, belongs to the second generation therapies, but the of the third generation, which are more recent, have also been shown to be effective for any disorder of anxiety. Among the latter, the following stand out: Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy and the Acceptance and commitment therapy.

In extreme cases, drug treatment is also a therapeutic action to consider, but it should always be combined with psychotherapy so that the symptoms are maintained over time.