Fear of flying

Fear of flying is a fear of air travel. It is also sometimes referred to as aviatophobia or aviophobia.

Overview
Commercial flight has become an important&mdash;and sometimes essential&mdash;part of modern life, yet flying continues to cause a significant proportion of the public to feel anxiety. When this anxiety reaches a level that significantly interferes with a person's ability to travel by air, it becomes a fear of flying.

Symptoms
A fear of flying is a level of anxiety so great that it prevents a person from travelling by air, or causes great distress to a person when he or she is compelled to travel by air. The most extreme manifestations can include panic attacks or vomiting at the mere sight or mention of an aircraft or air travel.

Perceived vs Actual risk
It is often said that flying is safer than driving, however, since fears and phobias for an individual are highly subjective, statistics are usually not relevant to the fear. One cannot imagine falling 30,000 feet at hundreds of miles an hour during an automobile crash. A plane crash usually kills the majority of the people, only sparing a "lucky" few, with broken backs or necks, to burn alive, or drown in the middle of an ocean. Versus driving, flying gives you less control and it's much harder for a plane to "pull over" in case of unexpected events.

Risk that an typical individual in the U.S. will die in a transportation accident during a single year is far higher for motor vehicles (1 in 7700) than for aircraft (1 in 2,067,000). However is possible to present statistics that appear to favor various conclusions when comparing air travel to certain other modes of transportation (such as automobiles). In every case, however, commercial airline travel is so safe that the risk of accidents, on an objective level, justify a level of anxiety great enough to have a practical impact on the lives of most people, and so a fear of flying is normally considered a phobia.

The same principles apply to potential risks of hijacking or terrorism, which are so small in reality that they dwindle to insignificance (and thus cannot justify a fear of flying).

Causes
The fear of flying may be created by various factors:
 * a fear of closed in spaces (claustrophobia), such as that of an aircraft cabin
 * a fear of heights (acrophobia)
 * a feeling of not being in control (since a passenger is not piloting the plane and can't get out at will)
 * previous traumatizing experiences while in flight (or having lost friends, co-workers, etc. to a plane crash)
 * fear of hijacking or terrorism
 * fear of turbulence
 * fear of having a panic attack

Some people blame the media as a major factor behind fear of flying, claiming the media sensationalizes airline crashes (and the high casualty rate per incident), in comparison to the perceived scant attention given the massive number of isolated automobile crashes.

Treatment
Some airline and travel companies run courses to help people get over the fear of flying: for example, Virgin Atlantic's Without Fear", or the anti-stress program of Air France. These courses use non-medical anti-stress techniques, education, and desensitization through direct experience to assist people in overcoming their fear of flying.

Medication
Fear of flying may also be treated by the use of psychoactive medications. For individuals experiencing anxiety due to a phobia, the standard psychiatric prescription might be any of a number of different psychoactive medications such as benzodiazepines or other relaxant/depressant drugs. Psychiatrists are sometimes reluctant to prescribe any medication for the treatment of fear of flying due to the need for patients to medicate irregularly.

Some individuals with fear of flying may self-medicate with other psychoactive substances&mdash;particularly alcohol, which is served in many commercial airline cabins&mdash;in order to deal with their anxiety. Most mental health professionals would advise against consuming alcohol as a medication both due to the strong risk of dependency (alcoholism) and due to the particular physiological effects on the body of air travel. In a pressurized cabin, the lower-than-normal oxygen content of the air will cause an alcoholic beverage to have a significantly enhanced effect on the body--resulting in a perhaps surprising level and rapidity of intoxication from only one or two drinks. On the other hand, some professionals believe that if an individual is capable of controlling his or her drinking&mdash;i.e. is not an alcoholic&mdash;and consumes only a small amount at a time, that an alcoholic beverage before or during a flight may be beneficial as a short-term treatment of the fear of flying. Most would still advise a more long-term strategy of systematic desensitization therapy.

Education
In some cases, educating people with a fear of flying about the realities of aviation can considerably diminish their fears. Learning how aircraft fly, how airliners are flown in practice, and other aspects of aviation can assist people with a fear of flying in overcoming its irrational nature. Some people with a fear of flying undertake education themselves; others attend courses (for people with the phobia or for people interested in aviation) to achieve the same result.

Desensitization
Gradually introducing people to the experience of flying through progressive and controlled experiences in a flying environment can also be conducive to overcoming the condition. Many fear-of-flying courses use desensitization extensively.