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On the women's board, Ann posted this in the workshop feedback thread, and I thought it would be good to make a new thread on inherited fear. She wrote: "That's a really interesting question Sue. I have noticed that both my sons (grown up now) use public toilets as little as possible, and my husband says that when he goes into a public toilet with them neither of them use the urinals. When they were at school they both refused to use the school toilets and we used to have to run home from school and clear a way through to the toilet because they were bursting to pee. I was sure they were unaware of my problems as they were growing up and hate to think that it might have been a behaviour they learned from me, but I'd be really interested in a professional view of paruresis as hereditary."
There was research reported on recently in the magazine Nature Neuroscience that seemed to show laboratory rats inheriting a specific fear. The parent rats were trained to fear the semell of a specific chemical. The pups were raised in the absebce of the parent, yet showed the same fear reaction. This trait showed in later generations as well. Dissection showed that there were differences in the neurons in the pups compared to a control group, and the relevant gene was different as well. The article can be found here:
This flies in the face of accepted genetics, but the research was apparently rigorous. Followiing normal scientific practice, research needs to be conducted by others to try to both replicate the results, and to try to disprove them. So early days.
Re: Inherited fear?
Posted by william on 9/2/2014, 7:03 pm, in reply to "Inherited fear?"
how can you inherit a conditioned response...??
I find that hard to believe.
What you can inherit is a sensitive bladder that freezes up with little anxiety.
Re: Inherited fear?
Posted by Kerry Chaplin on 10/2/2014, 12:31 pm, in reply to "Re: Inherited fear?"
It's an interesting thought, but having come clean about my issues a week or so ago with my 18 year old son, he tells me that he too has some problems - not to the same extent, he will use a cubicle in public toilets & can't go in houses when people are just outside the toilet talking etc. Is there any mileage in considering that there may be some inherited genetic predisposition to this type of anxiety response, which is then "learnt" through childhood? It does make me feel somewhat guilty that I may have passed on my issues to my children. On the plus side at least I can point him in the right direction to overcome the problem, without having to suffer for over 30 years like I have done.
I worried a great deal about this when my son was growing up lest he inherited or "caught" it from me. However, he did neither and told me a few years ago, when I finally confided in him, that he had no idea that I had problems. He is OK himself and says that his own son is,too. My son-in-law, now unfortunately dead, was also pee-shy but, as far as I know, none of his six sons have inherited it from him. My own feeling is that our problems arise from some "incident" that triggers them off, often in childhood, or from realising that someone we are on contact with has difficulties which we "catch". My advice to fathers with young sons is, as far as possible, to act "normally" when they need to pee. Go with them to the toilet, get them used to using the urinals and, if need be, give them the impression that you are peeing too, even if you can't. You may even find it helpful yourself ! Pete.
