Severe weather fears can be debilitating

From: USA Today | Date: December 1, 1996| Author: Anonymous | Copyright information

John Westefeld, a University of Iowa associate professor of counseling psychology, has identified a condition that affects people particularly strongly-fear of severe weather so extreme it may be considered a phobia. He studied 81 individuals in an effort to understand why some people are so afraid of thunderstorms and tornadoes that even a weather forecast for as far as a week ahead can leave them prisoners in their own homes. Fortysix were women and 35 were men. They ranged in age from 22 t...

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