8% of Americans Are Afraid of the Dark . . . and 2% Are Afraid of Dirt

The next time you’re supposed to help pull weeds, you can claim that you’ve developed a deeply rooted fear of . . . DIRT.

A new survey on PHOBIAS asked people about what fears they have . . . how intense they are . . . and how irrational and invasive they seem.  They asked about more than 30 phobias . . . and 83% of people had at least one.

There’s common stuff like:  30% said they are afraid of snakes . . . 28% are scared of heights . . . 24% said spiders . . . 23% have a fear of public speaking . . . and 21% are afraid of disease.

On the flip-side, there was some strange stuff:  6% said they have a fear of dogs, which is understandable.  Some are big and aggressive.  But 3% said they’re afraid of cats.  Another 3% said they’re scared of animals in general.

3% said they have a fear of bright lights . . . 2% have a FOOT phobia . . . and another 2% are deathly afraid of DIRT.  (???)  6% are afraid of the dark . . . and 16% claim they don’t have any fears.  So they’re literally FEARLESS.

When asked for the intensity . . . out of all the fears, the people afraid of snakes were the most crazy about it.  Fear of flying was the next most intense . . . followed fear of fire, cats, and fear of “large bodies of water.”

(YouGov)