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Fear of children
Fear of children and/or infants or childhood is alternately called pedophobia or pediaphobia.[1][2] Other age-focused fears are ephebiphobia and gerontophobia. Recognized outcomes of pedophobia include paternalism, adultism, and by extension, ageism. Additional recommended knowledge
Scientific analysisThe fear of children has been diagnosed and treated by psychiatrists, with studies examining the effects of multiple forms of treatment.[3] Sociologists have situated "contemporary fears about children and childhood", e.g. pedophobia, as "contributing to the ongoing social construction of childhood", suggesting that "generational power relations, in which children’s lives are bounded by adult surveillance" affect many aspects of society.[4] More than one study has identified the fear of children as a factor affecting biological conception in humans.[5][6] Popular perceptionPedophobia is the raison d'etre for several international social justice movements addressing young people, including children's rights and youth participation. Major international organizations addressing pedophobia, either outright or by implication, include Save the Children and Children's Defense Fund. However, some organizations, particularly those associated with the youth rights movement, claim that these movements actually perpetuate pedophobia.[7] The complicity of this notion is exacerbated by observations by experts such as Letty Cottin-Pogrebin, a founding editor of Ms. magazine, who is said to have diagnosed America as having an "epidemic of pedophobia", saying that,
Causes of the fear of childrenOne author suggests that the cause of the fear of children in academia specifically extends from adults' distinct awareness of the capacity of children as she wrote, "Children embarrass us because they point ever too cleverly and clearly to our denial of personal, material, and maternal history."[9] A separate report suggests that the source of current trends in the fear of children have a specific source, namely,
Addressing the fear of childrenAs mentioned above, social service, human rights, and social justice organizations have been tackling the fear of children for dozens of years. The United Nations has created the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which is implicitly designed to address pedophobia by fostering intergenerational equity between children and adults.[11] As evidenced above, pedophobia is distinctly addressed by academic, especially evidenced since the creation of the field of Youth studies. Exploring R. Kelly's pedophilia and the victimization of females in the African American community, Michael Eric Dyson, a recognized scholar in the areas of religion and humanities, addresses pedophobia head-on, suggesting that the way to change the popular fear of children is to,
The influence of the fear of children in American popular culture is examined by critical media analysts who have identified the effects of pedophobia in both Disney[13] and horror films.[14] A wide range of other authors and scholars, including Henry Giroux,[15] Mike Males and Barbara Kingsolver,[16] have suggested that the popular modern fear of children actually stems from corporatization of mass media and its complicity with a range of political and economic interests. Males perhaps goes the furthest, actually writing an entire book exploring the subject[17] See alsoReferences
Related reading
Categories: Anxiety disorders | Psychological conditions | Phobias |
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| This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Fear_of_children". A list of authors is available in Wikipedia. |
