It's hard when you know what you are afraid of, and it's hard when you don't know, too: Shared characte¬ristics and differences between fear and anxiety

Abstract

Although anxiety is one of the key phenomena in psychotherapy and related fields as well as in everyday life, the concept still lacks satisfactory scientific definition. Among the key reasons for this is unclear and unsuitable differentiation between anxiety and fear. Traditional distinctions between these two emo­tions were based on the perception of fear as a useful response to a real, tangible danger whereas anxiety was viewed as excessive, often a more or less pathological response to a threat that was less clear or even non-existent. Recent findings, including those of neuroscience, constitute an important contribution to the differentiation between anxiety and fear. They imply that the black-white distinction is inadequate and that conceptualization of both emotions as distinguishable and functional psychological adaptations is more appropriate. Presented also is the author’s model of differentiation between fear and anxiety in which the latter is defined as a response to the perception of threat that is either indistinct or less probable, or of threat for which probability cannot be sufficiently assessed.