When does fear, or respect for the power of weather become a phobia?

Dictionary.com defines phobia as the following: "A persistent, irrational fear of a specific object, activity, or situation that leads to a compelling desire to avoid it."

Weather Phobias

Do you have one or more of these? Well, it turns out, you're definitely not alone.

"Severe-Weather Phobia"

Dr. John Westefeld, from the University of Iowa's Counseling Psychology Program first coined the phrase "severe-weather phobia" referring in a 1996 paper in the Journal of Clinical Psychology. The study mainly deals with the fear of severe thunderstorms and/or tornadoes.

In a subsequent June 2006 paper in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Dr. Westefeld's team surveyed 139 mainly college-age people.

They found 76% of the respondents had at least a little fear of severe weather. Almost two-thirds of them had a prior experience with severe weather.

The most common symptom or behavior exhibited by the respondents was constant monitoring of media for information (TV, radio, internet). In more extreme cases this monitoring can begin at the mere mention of potential severe weather five days prior to the event! It was not clear whether this "monitoring" increases or decreases anxiety.

Here are some other symptoms revealed in Dr. Westefeld's study:

Dr. Westefeld then developed a treatment approach by which a meteorologist and psychologist worked together with the phobic. The meteorologist focused on basic weather education, risk, and preparedness, while the psychologist introduced relaxation techniques to cope with the anxiety.

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