trypophobia

English

WOTD – 28 November 2017

Etymology

From Ancient Greek τρῦπα (trûpa, “hole”) +‎ -phobia (from Ancient Greek φόβος (phóbos, “fear, phobia”)), said to have been coined by a blogger from Ireland in 2005.[1]

Pronunciation

(Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌtɹɪpəˈfəʊbi.ə/
- Audio (RP) (file)
(General American) enPR: trĭ'pə-fōʹbē-ə, IPA^(key): /ˌtɹɪpəˈfoʊbi.ə/
Rhymes: -əʊbiə
Hyphenation: try‧po‧pho‧bia

Noun

trypophobia (uncountable)

(psychology) An irrational or obsessive fear of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes, such as those found in honeycombs. [from 2005]
- 2013 October, G[eoff] G. Cole; A[rnold] J. Wilkins, “Fear of Holes”, in Psychological science, volume 24, number 10, DOI:10.1177/0956797613484937, PMID 23982244, pages 1980–1985:
  Images of lotus seed heads are often reported as inducing trypophobia. Sufferers of trypophobia report that it is the visual percept that is particularly aversive.
- 2015, Irena Milosevic, Trypophobia (Fear of Holes), Irena Milosevic, Randi E. McCabe (editors), Phobias: The Psychology of Irrational Fear, ABC-CLIO (Greenwood), page 401,
  In particular, individuals with trypophobia are fearful of clusters of holes that are found in a variety of objects and matter such as skin, coral, honeycombs, seed pods, and even aerated chocolate.

Related terms

trypophobe
trypophobic

Translations

fear of holes

Chinese:
Mandarin: 密集恐懼症／密集恐惧症 (zh) (mìjíkǒngjùzhèng)
Danish: trypofobi
Galician: tripofobia f
Greek: τρυποφοβία (el) (trypofovía)
Italian: tripofobia f
Spanish: tripofobia

References

“Louise” (23 May 2005), “Trypophobia”, in A Phobia of Holes, Yahoo! GeoCities‎, archived from the original on 2009-03-16, retrieved 26 September 2017: see Jennifer Abbasi (26 July 2011), “Is Trypophobia a Real Phobia?: We Investigate the Fear of Creepy Clustered Holes”, in Popular Science‎, archived from the original on 2017-09-12.