Are scorpions to blame for the fear of spiders?
Many people are afraid of spiders - but they are rarely dangerous to humans. The situation is different with scorpions: They could be the true origin of arachnophobia.
They have eight legs, like to hibernate on the ceiling, and the sight of them sends shivers down the spines of many: We're talking about spiders, of course. According to studies, around two to six percent of all people suffer from a pronounced arachnophobia, i.e. a fear of spiders. And many others also encounter the animals with a certain unease. But why is this actually the case?
Some psychologists assume that the silent and unpredictable way spiders move contributes to the fact that some people are afraid of them. Others, however, believe that the fear of spiders is a legacy from ancient times: Because our ancestors used to grapple with venomous spiders, a queasy feeling comes over us to this day when we catch sight of one. However, this thesis raises a few difficulties. For example, researchers estimate that only about 0.5 percent of all spider species are dangerous to humans - and those don't even live where the first humans made their home.
A team led by Daniel Frynta of Charles University in the Czech Republic has therefore come up with a new theory: The fear of spiders could actually stem from the fear of scorpions, whose physique bears certain similarities to that of spiders, the group writes in the journal Scientific Reports.
To test this assumption, the scientists presented more than 300 test subjects with a wide selection of creepy-crawlies, including various species of spiders, scorpions, cockroaches, earwigs, grasshoppers and beetles. Participants were asked to indicate on a seven-point scale how pretty, gross and scary they found the animals.
Spiders, scorpions - all the same to humans
Frynta and his colleagues discovered that the subjects consistently found spiders, scorpions and other members of the Chelicerata group to be the most disgusting, and they also tended to fear the animals. Insects, on the other hand, were perceived as the most harmless.
The team around Frynta interprets this as an indication that the fear of spiders could be based on a kind of generalized fear of animals with jaw claws. The researchers consider scorpions, which are likely to be the most dangerous jaw-clawed animals for humans, to be the reason for this. Unlike spiders, which account for about 200 deaths worldwide each year, scorpions kill about 2600 people per year, the authors write. Moreover, in Africa and the Middle East, venomous scorpion species may have also crossed paths with the first humans.
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