Davey G C
Psychology Department, City University, Northampton Sq, London, UK.
Br J Psychol. 1994 Nov;85 ( Pt 4):541-54. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1994.tb02540.x.
Two studies are described which report on the prevalence and intensity of self-reported fears to common indigenous animals in an adult UK population. The results of Study 1 suggest that (i) around a third of the variance in fear of indigenous animals can be accounted for by two factors which represent the theoretically coherent categories of invertebrates (e.g. slug, worm, cockroach) and fear-relevant animals (e.g. rat, snake, bat); (ii) females tend to report significantly greater levels of fear than males to a large majority of prevalently feared animals; and (iii) there were no obviously consistent patterns of fear with age. Study 2 identifies individual disgust sensitivity levels as being an important and significant predictor of fear of animals in both the invertebrate and fear-relevant categories, and finds that females report significantly higher disgust sensitivity levels than males. Since most of the prevalently feared indigenous animals appear to be disgust-relevant, this latter finding helps to explain the generally higher fear ratings given by females.
两项研究被描述，它们报告了英国成年人群体中对常见本土动物自我报告的恐惧的患病率和强度。研究1的结果表明：（i）对本土动物恐惧的约三分之一的差异可由两个因素解释，这两个因素代表了理论上连贯的无脊椎动物类别（如鼻涕虫、蠕虫、蟑螂）和与恐惧相关的动物类别（如老鼠、蛇、蝙蝠）；（ii）在大多数普遍令人恐惧的动物方面，女性报告的恐惧水平往往显著高于男性；（iii）恐惧与年龄之间没有明显一致的模式。研究2确定个体厌恶敏感度水平是无脊椎动物和与恐惧相关类别中动物恐惧的重要且显著的预测因素，并发现女性报告的厌恶敏感度水平显著高于男性。由于大多数普遍令人恐惧的本土动物似乎与厌恶相关，后一发现有助于解释女性普遍给出的更高恐惧评分。
