Word: phobias
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Counselors around the world run courses to help people cope with the fear of flying?which affects some 20-25% of passengers. "A classic symptom of a phobia is avoidance," says Peter Hughes, a British Airways pilot with 34 years' experience who runs programs for flying phobics in Britain. "People are simply staying on the ground. They don't feel ready to address their fears." In Asia that kind of avoidance is particularly strong. "It's the whole psychology of loss of face," says Hughes, "never admitting to having a fear, never mentioning it." This may be one reason...
Help may be on the way to Asia. Hughes hopes to offer courses in Hong Kong soon, while the Valk Foundation, a phobia-research institute in the Netherlands, is considering running courses in Japan. In the meantime, here are some tips for fearful flyers in Asia...
...computer system so bad? The bureau?s techno-phobia was one problem, as was an almost religious adherence to tradition. Of course, no one was helped by perennially bad decision-making by bureaucrats who are, for the most part, clueless about the leaps being made in information technology. "When the Bureau began its "computerization" in the mid-1980s, we were operating with very limited funding and the belief that we could do everything we needed to do with in-house talent," John Sennett, head of the FBI Agents Association, wrote in a recent e-mail gently admonishing his members...
...roller coasters and going to the top of the Eiffel Tower. I confronted my fears. This may not work for everybody, and it took a long time to have the guts to do it. But I decided that I wasn't going to live my whole life with my phobia. To others with phobias, I say, Don't let such fears control you. You deserve better. ADRIAN M. GONZALEZ GUERRA Monterrey, Mexico...
TIME.com ON AOL Take the phobia self-test online at www.time.com/health and if you're still not too scared, send an e-mail to letters@time.com about your own phobias. To chat with Jeffrey Kluger, go to AOL Live at 7 p.m. (E.T.) Wednesday...