There are certainly many situations in which it is not only rational, but prudent, to be afraid of another person. If someone physically threatens you, it’s virtually guaranteed that your best response is to get away from that person, and the sooner the better.
However, few of our interpersonal dealings involve such dire threat. It’s much more likely that the people you fear are those who make you concerned that you’ll lose your job, your relationships, your self-esteem, or something of emotional value to you.
How do we learn to fear others in the first place? It’s pretty clear that the emotion of fear is one that is hard-wired into all organisms. When we’re little, our fears can occupy a great deal of our emotional life, perhaps in large part because children are so vulnerable and unable to protect themselves. The bigger you get, the more likely it is you’ll grow out of those fears, both through acquiring greater physical size and a wider range of abilities and experiences. In even the worst case scenarios, such as if a bear decides to invade your campground, you’ve learned enough from the stories of others to figure out how best to get out of there in one piece.
University of Massachusetts Boston Economist Julie Nelson, in a 2015 article, argues that the experience of fear has become highly gendered, a problem that she applies to theory and practice in the field of economics. Men learn to fear fear because they associate emotions with a dangerous lack of control over the self and world. In her words, “Since bodies are far more vulnerable, mortal, and messy than the pure Cartesian cogito, contemplation of the feminine-associated aspects of human life may create anxiety” (p. 134). To avoid this, men gravitate away from the emotional world of fear and anxiety and toward a more analytical and objective one in which logic rules over feelings.
The danger of fearing fear, Nelson suggests, is that in their economic thinking, men prefer not to seem “risk averse.” It’s okay for women to base their decisions on the fear of negative outcomes, but men who do so are seen as sissies. When economic markets develop around men’s desires not to look risk averse, those markets become more likely to crash and burn, as we saw in the late 2000’s. If anything, the fear of fear only makes panic worse when things eventually start to go wrong: “Fear, kept unexamined and dammed up for too long, may then be manifested in excess when a crisis finally arrives—e.g., in financial panic or in support of totalitarian means for restoring order” (p. 137).
All of this may be very well and good, you may say, but what are the implications for your daily life? Fear may be a “logical emotion” in some cases, but what about when it’s not? Are there times when your fears are blown out of proportion in regard to particular people? If so, who are those people and why do you fear them?
Let’s take the example of the fear many people have toward their bosses. Obviously, an employer or supervisor controls your own economic stability. However, in the contemporary workplace, there are controls against a capriciously-behaving boss acting out in a moment of anger by firing a qualified employee. Due process and consistency with union statutes protect workers against this, as does the belief that many employers have in the value of supervisors and supervisees cooperating in a collegial way to maximize their organization’s productivity.
It’s possible that a supervisor truly deserves to be feared, acting out in unpredictable and punitive ways toward employees. However, it’s also very possible that people project their childhood fears of harm, or at least criticism, onto people who don’t act in fear-provoking ways.
Following from Nelson’s analysis, genderdynamics may also play into the relationships that men and women have in the workplace. By stifling their fears, so as not to look weak, men may actually be creating more anxiety for themselves. They don’t want to admit that they’re afraid of getting fired, allowing that undercurrent of worry to fester for weeks, months, or years. They may not even seek the supervisory evaluations, out of this fear, that would help them function as more adaptive employees.
Not only would men, according to this analysis, be afraid of their own fear, but women trying to look more “competent” (and male-like) attempt to cover up their emotional reactions as well. In such circumstances, no one is able to relax and, from the organization’s point of view, be terribly productive.
Let’s look at the other people in your life about whom you develop irrational fears. Spouses and romantic partners may certainly come to fear each other’s reactions, especially if there is a history of uncontrolled anger in the home. In relationships not marked by violence, though, partners may grow more trusting over the years and learn to overcome their irrational fears. Even when something goes wrong (you break yet another dinner plate), you don’t exactly become afraid of what your partner might do in return.
It’s probably the people you’re less close to on a daily basis who are the most likely to stimulate your fears. What will your in-laws do, for example, if you fail to send a thank-you letter for a birthday present, or you send one that isn’t to their liking? It’s not that you’re afraid of being harmed, but that you’re afraid of their disapproval. Unlike the workplace situation, it’s not a job you worry about losing. Instead, it’s the loss of positive regard.
Perhaps triggering more deep-seated anxieties about how well you fit in with the family as a whole, you translate what might be a neutral glance from that in-law as a glare filled with criticism. The fear this engenders only makes things worse, unfortunately, and you behave in an unnatural and overly guarded way that in turn creates actual grounds for negative feelings and poor communication.
Once you become able to separate your own insecurities from the actual threats that the people in your life present to you, not only will you feel better, but your relationships with those people will benefit as well. Looking at your inner reactions to the important people in your life will help you understand them, and yourself, that much better.
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