People who suffer from this problem experience feelings of fear and rejection of attractive women. It is also known as caligynephobia.
Some individuals whose partners stand out for their physicality feel a certain concern, because they believe that this quality increases the danger of losing it. However, the fear of venustraphobia, also called caligynephobia, goes much further, as they live in anguish from a feeling of persistent and unjustified apprehension. In principle, it is difficult for them to maintain a relationship with a girl they consider beautiful, since, although they feel her charm, they will tend to avoid her.
As with other obsessive aversions, the cause of venustraphobia can be found in a traumatic experience. Thus, the affected person could live, for example, a situation of rejection in which he felt humiliated by a female. This can lead him to generalize his experience, to associate beauty with risk situations and to reject similar circumstances so as not to fail again. There can also be a combination of factors, such as shyness, low self-esteem and machismo, which can lead to the appearance of these sensations, and can give rise to misogynistic behavior.
Most men love attractive women, or at least appreciate their healthy beauty; but for some people, the very idea of seeing a beautiful woman, let alone talking to her, can cause a full-blown panic attack. The scientific word for such fear or phobia is, as we have seen, venustraphobia or caligynephobia.
Like other phobias, it is an anxiety condition in which there is a persistent irrational or excessive fear of objects or situations. The symptoms of phobias can vary widely and can be from mild to severe and debilitating. In this case, venustraphobia is the irrational fear of beautiful women and sufferers find it extremely difficult to be around attractive women and may feel intense anxiety and fear when in the company of one. Beauty or attractiveness is a subjective and superficial characteristic to which we humans have been giving more and more importance throughout history.
Although looking at a pretty face probably won’t affect anyone, a small number of people looking at a pretty woman will feel some kind of arousal, and even fewer people will feel anxious when they’re in the same situation.
This extreme minority of people who encounter what is considered a “beautiful woman”, can experience such intense and intrusive anxiety that they can literally feel sick to their stomach just seeing one. Such is the case with those who suffer from venustraphobia.
We reviewed other strange phobias
Some are quite common, despite what we may believe:
- Athazagoraphobia – (fear of being forgotten or ignored and the fear of forgetting) This phobia is quite common, for example.
- Nomophobia – (Fear of not having access to a cell phone)
- Photophobia – (Fear of having a phobia)
- Anthophobia – (Fear of flowers)
- Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia – (Fear of number 666)
- Heliophobia – (Fear of sunlight)
- Chorophobia – (fear of dancing)
- Ablutophobia – (fear of bathing)
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