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Information Sciences Letters

Information Sciences Letters

Abstract

The present paper aimed to determine the fear of the unknown among normal people, people with psychological disorders, and people with organic disorders in the light of some demographic variables. The authors adopted the descriptive-comparative method and developed and applied a three-domain questionnaire to a randomly selected sample of (942) participants. The results showed that the people with psychological disorders suffer from fear of the unknown more than normal people and people with organic disorders at a significance level of (0.05). There were no statistically significant differences between the different categories of psychological disorders (including generalized anxiety disorder, depression, panic attacks, post-traumatic stress disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and phobia) in contrast with the organic diseases, in which cardiac and respiratory diseases were at a greater risk of being afraid of the unknown more than those with diabetes, blood pressure, and thyroid. The paper recommends conducting further studies on the concept of fear of the unknown in the Arab countries and adopting fear of the unknown as a psychological intervention for people with psychological disorders and people with cardiac and respiratory diseases.

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