Why a pathological fear persists
When we suffer from an alteration of fear, it automatically appears when faced with situations related to the fact that we fear.
An usual behavior is usually to try to avoid situations in which our emotional discomfort appears (physical and / or cognitive). For example, if a person talks about flying in a conversation, the person who is afraid of flying does not participate, if we find ourselves bad in a restaurant or in the subway … we go home…
This behavior reduces fear very quickly. However, in the medium term, the avoidance is bad, because we are learning that not doing what we are afraid of eliminates feeling the fear. However, it does not make fear to be resolved once and for all.
In addition, we also learn what is good to avoid in advance. That is, the more things related to the fact that we fear we can avoid, the better. Since that way I will have less fear. However, fear is usually widespread and generalized. Every time we fear more things; Maybe initially you were only afraid of the subway, but now you have developed fear the moment you leave home, travel…
In conclusion, Avoidance, Sensitization and Generalization explain why the emotional disorders of fear do not usually disappear alone or without a change in the behaviors that a person performs to manage their fear.