What Is Flight Anxiety and What Causes It?

A fear of flying is one of the most common phobias around, with 2.5% to 6.5% of the US population suffering from it. Even for those who find the idea of getting on a flight bearable, many still feel a sense of apprehension and worry. Understanding one's fear is the first step in helping to tackle it. So, with that in mind, let us look at flight anxiety and why we feel it.


What Is Aerophobia?
 

A fear of flying, or aerophobia, is an extreme fear of air travel. It's quite common (we're sure you know someone who hates flying) with sufferers experiencing anything from feeling tense and worried to severe panic attacks. In many cases, this debilitating fear of air travel causes many to avoid taking to the air at all. 

 

Most Effective Medication For Flight Anxiety - with and without prescription

Sufferers tend to fall into two camps.

 

Firstly are those who can rationalize that the plane is safe but worried their fear might cause them to lose control, embarrassing themselves and others in the process. The second are those who focus on the plane and flight itself, worrying about things such as engine failure, bad weather, and turbulence.

What Causes It?

Like any phobia or fear, the causes can be variable and not necessarily due to one specific trauma. If we were to take claustrophobia, for instance, it's much more likely that a sufferer may have had a childhood experience where they perhaps were once trapped in a cupboard or maybe an elevator - sparking a fear response. This common phobia is often related to aerophobia because sufferers feel trapped on the aircraft once airborne. 

For some, it's the simple fact that man wasn't born to fly, and soaring over 30,000 feet in the air seems strange and scary. Similarly, humanity wasn't born to speed on a motorway at 100km/h, but a fear of being in an automobile is far less common. 

Perhaps the sufferer has flown in the past, and some turbulence ruined the experience. For many, it can be reading the news of a rare aviation accident and the anxiety that it could happen to them, despite the statistics proving it's astronomically unlikely that it would. 

To begin to process your fear of flying and its causes first, you must ask yourself.

'Why am I afraid of flying?'

and

'When did this fear start?'

With this information in hand, you can begin your journey to tackle your anxiety of air travel and, with the use of professional help or an airline run course, begin curing your fear. Don't forget to bring your favorite word puzzles with you. Solving Scrabble is always an efficient way to keep your fears at bay.

Study Time

It may seem counterintuitive for those scared of air travel to delve into the topic, but reading up on the numerous safety features of modern aircraft, the causes of turbulence, and the science behind flying has helped many calm irrational thoughts. 

Nowadays, you can also find hundreds of videos online which tackle the issue of fear anxiety from a multitude of fascinating angles.