The word angrophobia refers to the excessive fear of anger . It is a fear of the anger of others and also the fear of getting angry or being perceived as an “angry” person. Although it is a phenomenon that has not been studied by psychopathology, it is a term that is used with some frequency in colloquial language, which makes it worth reviewing.

We will see below what angrophobia is as well as some hypotheses about its causes and consequences.

What is angrophobia?

As the name implies, angrophobia is the irrational or excessive fear of anger. It is, on the one hand, the fear of getting angry. This means that you are afraid of experiencing feelings of anger, upset or displeasure towards one or more people. On the other hand, it is a fear of other people experiencing such feelings towards oneself.

As it is a phobia, we can say that the irrational fear that characterizes it arises from the combination of external stressful events , which may or may not be objectively harmful, with a certain personal scheme of coping with such events.

Although not in all cases, phobias can cause clinically significant discomfort, that is, they can affect the way a person conducts his or her daily activities. If the phobia is a phobia of the emotion of anger, it is likely that, if such discomfort occurs, it will affect the way the person relates.

That is, while anger is one of the basic emotions and is present in most everyday interactions , a person who is afraid of this emotion may have some difficulty in establishing and maintaining interpersonal relationships. For the same reason it could be considered a type of social phobia.

However, this phobia, as we have said, is not a disease or a clinical picture that is recognized as such by specialists. It is a term that is part of colloquial language and is used more in literary narrative to express the fear of anger, and also its consequences.

Why fear anger?

Anger is an emotion that has traditionally been studied and analyzed as a “negative emotion”. On the one hand it has been catalogued as such because of its association with conflict situations involving a series of physical ailments ranging from increased blood flow, to increased heart rate and the presence of a significant amount of energy, which can sometimes be channelled in an aggressive or violent manner.

From the above, we have generated a whole series of rules about who, when, how and where it is appropriate to get angry at, and in what circumstances or towards what people we do not.

The contradictory socialization of anger

The socialization that many people have gone through by means of anger has been to stop it, or in any case, exchange it for calm, control, relief, pauses , or by minimizing the situations we have been angry about. This has even been done by labelling ourselves as “dumb” once we have become angry. Since we are young, we are asked, on the one hand, to avoid experiencing anger, or at least to avoid its expression being noticeable; and on the other hand, we are demanded the opposite: to express it, since it is the best way to channel it adequately (Renata-Franco and Sánchez Aragón, 2010).

Emotional education towards anger has therefore been contradictory, which is often part of both the family and the school, the media and the scientific theories of emotions themselves. Thus, a culture of fear of negative emotions, such as anger, has been generated and generalized by the idea that the latter can prevent us from both happiness and the achievement of personal goals, as well as interaction and the fulfillment of our duty to be social.

From rejection to fear to “negative emotions”

If we go a little further and are more specific on this issue, we can see that, in fact, there are some profiles of individuals who have been allowed to historically and socially feel or express their anger in certain ways; and there are other profiles of individuals who have been denied the same ways. To give one example, externalized anger in the form of physical aggression or high-flown words may be more socially accepted in masculinity than in femininity.

In the face of such a reaction, people may later receive different reprimands and rejections. In fact, it is common to use the adjective “angry” or “upset” to talk about certain people and to justify the few intentions of living with them. This issue is one that can trigger a progressive fear of anger and a denial of that emotion that leads to irrational fears.

In this sense, angrophobia can manifest itself in different ways in different people: some may be afraid of being perceived as angry, and socially rejected thanks to this perception ; and others, may be afraid of triggering the anger of others. The consequence in any case may be to avoid expressing opinions, thoughts or behaviours determined by fear of being perceived as easily angry, or by fear of others becoming angry with them.

Treatment of irrational fear of anger

After having experienced a contradictory emotional education about negative emotions such as anger, and without having reinforced solid coping schemes when faced with conflictive situations that may provoke such an emotion, it is to be expected that some people develop an excessive need to avoid anger in all its expressions .

As when any need develops in an excessive manner, exposure to the event that triggers the stress (in this case, anger), can cause significant discomfort, ranging from states of stress or anxiety and their physical correlates, to obsessive thoughts and withdrawal behaviors that protect from the perceived risky event.

Therefore, one way to prevent angrophobia is to analyze the components that surround such irrational fear and to work to reconcile, outside of the contradiction, an emotional education that is truly oriented towards assertiveness. It is necessary to work with mental health professionals who guide the process through psychotherapy.

Bibliographic references:

  • Retana-Franco, B. and Sánchez-Aragón, R. (2010). Tracking in the past… ways to regulate happiness, sadness, love, anger and fear. Universitas Psychologica, 9(1): 179-197.