Complete Idiot's Guide to Conquering Fear and Anxiety

Page 59(table continued from previous page)7­8 years 9­12 years TeensSupernatural beings (ghosts, spookythings, aliens)Tests and examinations in schoolFear of failureDark School performances Social fearsBodily injury Bodily injury SexualityStaying alone Physical appearance Physical appearanceMore realistic fears (natural disasters,media reports of violence, war, death,and so on)Thunder and lightningDeathDarkIn ArmsAt six­months, Serita cooed happily in her Grandmother's arms and there was nothing to indicate she would later be frightened of falling down the stairs. But at eightmonths, when Serita crawled to the edge of the stairs, she looked down and started to cry. When Grandma, whom she hadn't seen for a few weeks, picked her up,she burst into tears. She didn't stop crying until her mother walked in the room, said "poor baby" and took Serita into her arms.Though young infants will be startled and become distressed at loud noises or loss of support, your baby won't show actual fear until the second half of the first year.Fear of heights begins when she becomes good at crawling. Fear of strangers starts at around eight months of age when your baby now recognizes you as "mother" or"father": she is now officially attached to you, and no one else will quite do. When Grandma tried to soothe Serita, she didn't match her "working model" of hermother­her touch, her smell, her voice, her face. This discrepancy between the familiar and unfamiliar, explains Harvard developmental psychologist Jerome Kagan, isat the heart of stranger anxiety. If Grandma sat down to play with a content Serita, Serita may have found the newness of Grandma interesting. But because Serita feltthreatened, the discrepancy between the familiar and unfamiliar was too great for her to handle and mother's comfort was not replaceable.