Hippophobia is an extreme fear of horses, which can be associated with riding them or simply being around them. It can be caused by a traumatic experience or have no apparent cause. Phobias are irrational fears that can interfere with daily life, and animal phobias are among the most common.
A phobia is an extreme fear, usually irrational and generally classified as a psychological disorder. Hippophobia is a condition in which a person has an extreme fear of horses. People suffering from such fear may have an abnormal fear of horses in general, but the fear could also be associated with riding them. Hippophobia can, in fact, originate from a traumatic experience with a horse, such as a fall while out riding, but it can also exist with no known or apparent cause.
Phobias are not the same everyday fears experienced by most people. The fear in this case is extreme, making it more like dread than just fright. Phobias can be so intense that they interfere with the life of the phobic. A hippophobe, for example, may not be physically able to attend a circus or visit a ranch without panicking, and would certainly not be able to ride a horse or travel in a horse-drawn carriage. Even television or artistic images of horses can be enough to dramatically affect someone with pronounced hippophobia.
The fear defined as a phobia is also irrational, meaning that the fear is disproportionate to the risk involved. For example, a person with hippophobia may refuse to participate in a parade, believing not only that the risk of being trampled by a horse is real, but that it will most likely happen. In many cases, however, the logic behind the fear isn’t even that clearly thought through. The hippophobe simply experiences an indefinite mortal terror in the presence of horses.
Hippophobia frequently develops in response to a specific event. This can be something that happens to the phobic individual, such as being thrown from a horse, but the phobia can also develop from simply witnessing such an incident or even from reading or hearing an account of one. Also, some phobias have no apparent basis and no known cause. Onset can be sudden and unexpected.
The term “hippophobia” comes from two Greek words: “hippo” means “horse” and “phobos” means “fear”. The fear of horses is also known as “equinophobia”. This word is a combination of the Latin word for horse, “Equus” and the Greek “phobos”.
Animal phobias are among the most common phobias. These can include apiphobia, which is a fear of bees; ornithophobia, the fear of birds; ailurophobia, the fear of cats; cynophobia, the fear of dogs; and ichthyophobia, the fear of fish. The general fear of animals is known as zoophobia.
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