"Everyone knows what it is to be afraid. But phobias take the normal (and even helpful!) human emotion of fear to a much more visceral, even primal, place. For some people, it's a spider that does it. For others, it's a clown, or a trans-Atlantic flight, or even just a puddle of water. It's the thing that stops us in our tracks, sets our hearts racing, and stands our hair on end. Scared Stiff takes readers on a journey through these experiences--using biology, psychology, and history to explain where our phobias come from, how they affect us, and how we might eventually overcome them"--Back cover.