Neophobia

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As Neophobie (Latin. Neophobia ) is afraid of something new, unknown situations, new things or foreign persons designated. Other names are cainophobia , cainolophobia or misoneism . People and animals with a fear of new things are also called neophobic as opposed to neophilic (“ curiosity ”). The term misoneism (Greek μίσος , misos 'hate', νέος, neos 'new') is widespread among authors like Gabriel Tarde . It clarifies more the aggressively negative and repulsive parts, some of which go far beyond a purely phobic avoidance reaction.

Educational language

Neophobia (composed of the Greek neo- 'new' and φόβος 'fear, fear') was first used by Kaltschmidt in 1863 for “ fear of innovation” in technical and educational language. Neophilia is considered an antonym ; derived adjectives are neophobic and neophobic . Friedrich Erdmann Petri already defined neophobia in his 1852 published "Pressed Handbook of Foreign Words in German written and colloquial language" as Greek for "fear of innovation".

Natural sciences

In behavioral research and medicine , the term is currently mainly used in two contexts: the description of animal behavior and the eating behavior of people in childhood.

For example, neophobic versus neophilic behavior found in laboratory rats in early adolescence was observed in different environments over the entire lifetime and it was found that (male) neophobic rats lived on average 599 days, while the mean survival time in neophilic rats was 701 days; while all neophobic rats had died after 840 days, the maximum survival time in neophilic rats was 1,026 days. These differences can be attributed to increased plasma levels of corticosteroids .

On the other hand, avoiding certain, unknown foods is also called neophobia and a “food neophobia scale ” ( FNS) is used to determine these behavioral characteristics more precisely . In children, the Child Food Neophobia Scale (CFNS) shows that neophobia to food under real conditions leads to a lower intake of fruits, vegetables and protein-rich foods than control persons of the same age. These studies are important because of the massive increase in overweight among children and adolescents around the world and the associated health consequences.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Otto Dornblüth: Clinical Dictionary. 13/14 edition. 1927.
  2. ↑ Gabriel Tarde: The Laws of Imitation. 1890.
  3. ↑ Michael Kinne: The prefixes post-, pre- and neo-. Gunter Narr Verlag, 2000, p. 359. ( online in Google books )
  4. ↑ Friedrich Erdmann Petri : Pressed manual of foreign words. Arnoldi, 1852, p. 557. ( online in Google books)
  5. ↑ SA Cavigelli, MK McClintock: Fear of novelty in infant rats predicts adult corticosterone dynamics and to early death. In: PNAS. 100, 2003, pp. 16131-16136; doi: 10.1073 / pnas.2535721100 (engl.)
  6. ↑ N. Rigal et al .: Food neophobia in the context of a varied diet induced by a weight reduction program in massively obese adolescents. In: Appetite. March 2006, pp. 207-214. PMID 16499998 .