Why are people afraid of spiders?

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   TheKatsMeowposted 11 years ago

   Why are people afraid of spiders?

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   Phoebe Pikeposted 11 years ago

   They have been taught to fear them because our parents were afraid. It's a taught fear. The only way to not be afraid is to educate yourself on them and associate with them. No one likes to be bitten and many are frightened by what they look like. Add the fact some are poisonous and not very friendly and there you have it.

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   Civil War Bobposted 11 years ago

   Apparently they haven't realized that the human foot in a boot is way bigger than most spiders and can be used to overcome fear.

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      katielroseposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      What if you're not wearing shoes, like when spiders are inside your house, and what about the ones that jump?

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   duffsmomposted 11 years ago

   I am not afraid of spiders but I really really dislike them.  I do not want them on me, or in my bed, or house or whatever.  I have seen really large spiders outside on the wood pile and I am fine with that - but please stay out of my house.
   
   I have always felt that way about spiders, but neither of my parents were that way so I did not learn it from them.  I know often there is no rhyme or reason for it. I dislike spiders but snakes don't bother me.  Weird I guess.

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   tussinposted 11 years ago

   They look ugly and they act creepy.  Ever notice how when you see a spider and the spider sees you it stops in its tracks?  Other bugs don't do that; they just keep moving along.

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   katielroseposted 11 years ago

   Some spiders are poisonous. I'm no expert on spiders to know which ones are and which ones are not, so I think it best to avoid them altogether. I have no problem with Daddy-Long-Legs and other spiders I can easily identify as being non-poisonous though.

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      Shaddieposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Actually, no spider is poisonous

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      katielroseposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Actually, about 200 out of the 40,000 known species of spiders have serious, potentially lethal bites per wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisonous_spiders

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      Shaddieposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Venom, not poison, m'dear.

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      katielroseposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      OK seriously, if you want to argue semantics, Venom is a type of poison secreted by animals and typically delivered by biting or stinging. "Poison" may be more broad than "venom," but that doesn't make it any less lethal.

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      Shaddieposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      If you want to argue semantics, venom is not a type of poison, but they are both toxins.

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      katielroseposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Then you might want to write to Encyclopedia Britannica and Merriam-Webster's Dictionary and let them know they're wrong

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   Elliefaceposted 11 years ago

   I'm not afraid of them, but I don't like how they move. Personally, anything that moves with 8 legs creeps me out. It just looks sooooo unnatural. Ughhhhh.

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      katielroseposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      8 legs are bad enough, what about centipedes and millipedes though? Eww.

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      Elliefaceposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Yeah, those are kind of creepy too.

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   Shaddieposted 11 years ago

   People fear the things they don't understand. They are disgusted by things they don't want to understand. And they avoid anything that doesn't fit into their cookie-cutter ideal of 'cute and cuddly.'

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      calculus-geometryposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Our notions of cute and cuddly are instinctual.  They are "cookie cutter" because our brains have evolved that way. The less human an animal looks human, the more suspicion and fear we regard it with. It keeps us from going extinct.

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