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Mini: Hippo... phobia · Why We Do What We Do

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Why we do what we do many I'm
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  Speaker 1: your host Abraham and I'm Shane. We are a psychology
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  Speaker 1: podcast and once a week we release these short form
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  Speaker 1: episodes where we do a nice ten to fifteen minute
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  Speaker 1: dive and do a topic. And for the month of
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  Speaker 1: Halloween we or the month of October, which is the
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  Speaker 1: month in which Halloween takes place, We have decided that
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  Speaker 1: our minis are all going to be themed around some
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  Speaker 1: specific phobias. We might do this every year, we might
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  Speaker 1: change it up, we haven't decided, but this is our
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  Speaker 1: first time with minis in the month of October, so
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  Speaker 1: this is what we chose this time around. And we
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  Speaker 1: are talking about hippopotamus strosis squiptaliaphobiah.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yes we are. That's exactly what we're talking about.
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  Speaker 2: That word that you just said.
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  Speaker 1: Words are difficult. Sometimes we have all had had instances
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  Speaker 1: of misspeaking or mispronouncing words and it doesn't feel good.
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  Speaker 1: But for some it might be very anxiety provoking. So
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  Speaker 1: hippopotamon strossiskuyptaliophobia, which, as you can tell, I have practiced
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  Speaker 1: many many times on how to say this word.
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  Speaker 3: Yes you have, uh huh.
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  Speaker 1: It is also called sisquept This one I practiced less.
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  Speaker 1: Cisqueptaliophobia is essentially the fear of long words, if you
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  Speaker 1: didn't already know, and yes, at thirty six letters long,
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  Speaker 1: it is one of the longest words in the English language.
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  Speaker 1: For etymology, fun the sesquid. It's Latin for one and
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  Speaker 1: a half. And what I read somewhere was that, presumably
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  Speaker 1: sesquiptalia verba was a criticism of writers who used words
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  Speaker 1: that were too long. They said they were a foot
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  Speaker 1: and a half long, so they were basically half as
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  Speaker 1: long half again, longer than they needed to be, and
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  Speaker 1: and was thus confusing for people. Yeah, that is sort
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  Speaker 1: of the etymology behind the sort of original name for this,
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  Speaker 1: the fear of long words was the sesquipt dallaphobia.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, so, uh, the hip hip hippopota hippopota mastros phobia.
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  Speaker 2: That name was created in two thousand by American poet
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  Speaker 2: amy net good Lord amy nessmats nez houku matah heel
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  Speaker 2: not tathiel.
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  Speaker 1: Something like that. I didn't look it up.
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  Speaker 2: Nez hooku matathiel okayuka matathil.
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  Speaker 3: That's how I'm going with that. That feels right.
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  Speaker 2: Who worked to add extra the extra syllables, presumably for
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  Speaker 2: wordplay effect. So a poet came up with this and
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  Speaker 2: that just feels mean, does.
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  Speaker 1: Feel kind of mean? That is true, all right. So
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  Speaker 1: this phobia that we have been describing so far, it
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  Speaker 1: falls into the category of specific phobias and in this
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  Speaker 1: case social phobias. But importantly, and very similar to other
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  Speaker 1: phobias that we have actually discussed on here, this is
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  Speaker 1: not actually in the DSM five, so you will not
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  Speaker 1: receive an official diagnosis of hippopotamins josis scriptaliophobia.
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  Speaker 3: You're just showing off, now, I am.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, you've earned it, You've worked for it, so
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  Speaker 2: like please by all means. It's like when you learn
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  Speaker 2: a new yoyo trick, you have to show.
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  Speaker 3: Everybody the word yo yo. Yoyo's are so fun.
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  Speaker 2: Like other phobias, this might be diagnosed quote unquote, albeit unofficially,
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  Speaker 2: as it's not a diagnosis by excessive fear that is
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  Speaker 2: disproportionate to the stimulus event or the circumstance or the
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  Speaker 2: context in which it occurs. So basically you have this
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  Speaker 2: kind of like above level experience around long words that
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  Speaker 2: other people don't have.
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  Speaker 1: Now, again, like other specific phobias. This tends to evoke
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  Speaker 1: behavior of a escaping or avoiding the feared stimulus, which
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  Speaker 1: can physically look like shortness of breath, heart palpitations, sweating,
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  Speaker 1: chest pain, abdominal discomfort, nausea, fainting, trembling, tingling, chills, pupil dilation,
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  Speaker 1: and then to qualify as like a specific phobia, it
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  Speaker 1: must last six months or longer for it to be
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  Speaker 1: like diagnosed as a phobia of some sort.
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  Speaker 2: Right, So for this phobia, it can be with respect
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  Speaker 2: to trying to say or read the words, not necessarily
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  Speaker 2: just hearing them.
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  Speaker 3: So they're not like seeing a word and going ah,
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  Speaker 3: I don't like that.
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  Speaker 2: Like it's there's a little bit of like saying it
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  Speaker 2: out loud, trying to read it, and really kind of
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  Speaker 2: like operating in those academic spaces. So there's some suggestion
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  Speaker 2: that children with this may avoid academic situations and reading.
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  Speaker 2: So and although one source suggested that this could affect
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  Speaker 2: three to fifteen percent of the population, there are some
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  Speaker 2: who believe that this condition may not actually exist at all,
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  Speaker 2: at least not as an individual thing.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, now, this three to fifteen percent, I want to
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  Speaker 1: put that in perspective here, because that is a staggering number.
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  Speaker 1: I'd be willing to bet that most of you listening
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  Speaker 1: to us have at least heard of autism, right, and
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  Speaker 1: you probably have not heard of hippopotam on strosis script allophobia.
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  Speaker 1: So for reference, though, autism appears to occur and only
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  Speaker 1: like one to two percent of the population, so three
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  Speaker 1: to fifteen percent would be a huge amount of people
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  Speaker 1: for whom this is a condition that they experience, So
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  Speaker 1: that number seems unworkably large to me in my skeptical mind.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it feels like too many people.
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  Speaker 2: Now, one of the diagnostic features a professional might look
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  Speaker 2: for is hesitating at large words, But it's pretty natural
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  Speaker 2: to balk at large words like you have seen me
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  Speaker 2: do on this episode already, without it being a pathology.
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  Speaker 2: Like I have seen that word, and I have stopped
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  Speaker 2: several times to go huh and not read it, or
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  Speaker 2: at least made an attempt, but it took a minute
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  Speaker 2: to get there. So part of that's like me just
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  Speaker 2: understanding the words. So it doesn't necessarily be a pathology
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  Speaker 2: to avoid starting a word.
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  Speaker 1: And it's not a pathology to be afraid of an
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  Speaker 1: ad all right, So we've been talking also sort of
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  Speaker 1: taking this skeptical angle here, and I think it's worth
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  Speaker 1: continuing down that path. And it's not just us either,
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  Speaker 1: Like some professionals suggest that the fear of long words
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  Speaker 1: is actually more of a symptom of social phobias, like
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  Speaker 1: a symptom of them more generally, and not actually a
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  Speaker 1: fear of long words specifically. It's just how that social
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  Speaker 1: phobia tends to manifest for some people, is in them
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  Speaker 1: trying to read or speak and use longer words with
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  Speaker 1: which the less comfortable I.
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  Speaker 2: Guess right, so further hip a pot of monstrous squizzopholia,
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  Speaker 2: which you know, Abraham did put this in here multiple
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  Speaker 2: times just to mess with me, so like and like
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  Speaker 2: what even so far as to put that note in
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  Speaker 2: the note.
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  Speaker 3: To be like, yes, I did this, so.
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  Speaker 2: You're welcome what everybody, Yeah, just really appreciate that it
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  Speaker 2: actually may be more of a symptom of other anxiety
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  Speaker 2: disorders and other mental health conditions than a thing unto itself.
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  Speaker 2: And this is partially evidenced by the fact that when
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  Speaker 2: and if it is diagnosed, it seems to be in
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  Speaker 2: the context of other mental health conditions we've.
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  Speaker 1: Talked about, like comorbid diagnoses, before. But the thing is
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  Speaker 1: that there are a lot of them, right, but like
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  Speaker 1: they they could occur in isolation, Like you could have
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  Speaker 1: a diagnosis that doesn't overlap with something else. It does
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  Speaker 1: like a certain percentage of the time, but not all
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  Speaker 1: of the time, maybe not even half of the time.
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  Speaker 1: But this one, it seems like it's pretty rare and
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  Speaker 1: it pretty much always overlaps with something, which seems to
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  Speaker 1: suggest that probably it's more of it being part of
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  Speaker 1: the suite of disorders, if you will, the ensemble of
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  Speaker 1: other things that someone is dealing with, and again is
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  Speaker 1: more of a symptom than a cause, which yeah, with
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  Speaker 1: a whole discussion unto itself. I think that we've talked about, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: a long time ago, and the difficulty of diagnosing mental
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  Speaker 1: health disorders and like how the DSM works and stuff
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  Speaker 1: like that.
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  Speaker 2: Well, and I think I could see this being like
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  Speaker 2: related to something like learning disability or something like dyslexia.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, where like yeah, very much. Of course, you see
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  Speaker 3: a word that's thirty six letters and you go, no,
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  Speaker 3: I'm not even gonna bother with that because it's.
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  Speaker 1: I you know, yes, I'm excited to have this be
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  Speaker 1: the title of the episode. And see if anybody even
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  Speaker 1: bothers to tune into listen. So if you deend and
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  Speaker 1: you made it here and thank you, I'm impressed.
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  Speaker 3: I'm glad being here. Yeah, it's great.
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  Speaker 1: It's sort of common boilerplate stuff here. In terms of
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  Speaker 1: what you might do for treatment, as we have discussed.
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  Speaker 1: Common interventions for things like many specific phobias consist of
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  Speaker 1: things such as CBT, which was cognitive behavioral therapy, and
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  Speaker 1: then exposure and response prevention, which is basically exposure therapy.
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  Speaker 1: But there are some other suggestions that people have to
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  Speaker 1: just help with people who have some discomfort around this,
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  Speaker 1: which includes strategies like meditation generally to just help sort
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  Speaker 1: of bring your overall level of anxiety down breaking words
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  Speaker 1: into smaller components, which I did do to learn and
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  Speaker 1: practice this word. But I also did watch some pronunciation
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  Speaker 1: videos because I wanted to get it right, and then
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  Speaker 1: I got sort of proficient at it, which made me
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  Speaker 1: want to do it a bunch, and then I was like,
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  Speaker 1: it really fun to watch Shane squirm as winter this.
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  Speaker 3: So yeah, barely made it through, didn't even say it
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  Speaker 3: right once.
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  Speaker 1: The other other suggestion is to just take your time
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  Speaker 1: with long words just work them out until you feel
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  Speaker 1: comfortable with them. They do suggest that you can substitute
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  Speaker 1: shorter words. There's some escape in there that might necessarily
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  Speaker 1: That might not necessarily be the healthiest or most productive way,
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  Speaker 1: but it could help at least in some instances. They
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  Speaker 1: recommend getting enough sleep, which is probably just good advice,
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  Speaker 1: and then also deep breathing again, trying to help bring
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  Speaker 1: down the level of anxiety that someone might be experiencing.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, So why does this even develop? Like where
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  Speaker 3: how do we even get there?
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  Speaker 2: Well, a lot of its context, it's conditions, it's motivations
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  Speaker 2: and stuff like that. Ultimately, what we land on is
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  Speaker 2: everybody has their unique learning experiences. Sometimes words are difficult.
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  Speaker 2: Maybe you had a traumatic event having to do with
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  Speaker 2: trying to read out loud at some point in time
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  Speaker 2: in school and that was horrible. So there's a lot
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  Speaker 2: of things that happen that lead to this. But I
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  Speaker 2: think ultimately it's important to know that, like, you're likely
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  Speaker 2: if you experience this, it's likely.
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  Speaker 3: Because of some other things. It's not just this thing.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's worth investigating. If you feel like you need support,
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  Speaker 1: find yourself a therapist, talk to your doctor or medical
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  Speaker 1: professional that is not us, and look into finding support
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  Speaker 1: of this if you need it. But I think that
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  Speaker 1: is what we have to say. We're right in the
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  Speaker 1: sweet spot of timing lengths on the duration of this.
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  Speaker 1: So yeah, is there anything else that you would like
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  Speaker 1: to add or anything that I forgot before we wrap
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  Speaker 1: this up?
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  Speaker 3: No, I'm gonna use the word by because it's much shorter. Excellent.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you all so much for listening. Thank you
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: to our Patreon supporters. If you like to support us,
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: you can join us on Patreon. You'll get ad free episodes,
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: early episodes, and behind the scenes content. You can pick
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: up some merchant our merch store, leave us a rating
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: and review, or go tell a friend and maybe go
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: cure a specific phobia and call the cure why we
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: do what we do? Maybe would be fun. I like
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: you can also reach out to us and tell us
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: about your hippopotamus. I almost had it and I lost it.
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  Speaker 1: Tell us about your hippopotamon. Strossis squipt aliaphobia. Would be
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  Speaker 1: interested in hearing from you, since apparently it affects more
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  Speaker 1: people than have autism, which doesn't seem real. But otherwise.
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  Speaker 1: You can also reach us on the social media platforms.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: We're happy to hear from you there, but I think
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  Speaker 1: that is all that I have, So thank you for
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: recording with me today, Shane. Thank you everyone for listening.
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: This is Abraham and it's a Shane.
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  Speaker 1: We're out, Happy Halloween, goodbye. You've been listening to Why
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: We Do What We Do.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: going to WWDWWD podcast dot com.
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: Thanks for listening, and we hope you have an awesome
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  Speaker 3: day