IMAJU LI DJECA I MAJKE ISTE STRAHOVE?
DO CHILDREN AND MOTHERS HAVE THE SAME FEARS?

Summary/Abstract: Fears are present in all parts of human life, but their content and intensity change in different ages. Research suggests that anxiety is partly hereditary, but also that the environment in which a child grows up has a significant role in the development of his fears (which can be observed within the framework of social learning theory). This study was conducted with 92 mothers of children aged 4 to 6. For the purpose of the study, a list of the most common fears was compiled, on which mothers were asked to mark those they had noticed in their child of preschool age. In the second part of the study, mothers were asked to recall their own fears when they were in preschool age, and finally, to mark fears they have now, as adults. The results of the study show that there is a significant correlation between the total number of fears in children and mothers (in preschool age and in adulthood). For fears of specific content, differences in the proportions of children with that fear were analyzed depending on the presence of mother’s fear. The results show that the proportion of children with a certain fear is significantly higher when the mother also remembers experiencing the same fear in preschool age. The results support the hypothesis of the transfer of specific fears from mother to child but also support the role of the environment in the development of fears in children.

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