Automatonophobia
Automatonophobia is a fear of human-like figures, such as mannequins, wax figures, statues, dummies, animatronics, or robots. It is a specific phobia, or a fear of something that causes significant and excessive stress and anxiety and can negatively affect a person’s quality of life. Automatonophobia causes an automatic, uncontrollable fear response to human-like figures. The sight or thought of these human-like figures can trigger anxiety for some people. Pediophobia is a fear of dolls and is a related phobia. Research has shown that people with phobias have increased visual threat detection of their fear, even when simply viewing pictures of that fear. Symptoms include both the psychological and physical symptoms of anxiety. Under the DSM-5 criteria, you may have a specific phobia like automatonophobia if:
Treatment for automatonophobia rarely require medication. In most situations, help is usually found in the use of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and exposure therapy. |