scubadiver
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Joined: 26 Apr 2006
Posts: 1850
Location: Currently Andover
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 Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:55 am Post subject: Interesting study: More Britons living in fear - Telegraph |
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I suppose its just what they want...
Britons 'living in fear' as record numbers suffer from anxiety
| Quote: | In one of the most wide-ranging studies of its kind, three quarters of people said they thought the world had become a more frightening place over the last decade.
Issues such as terrorism, knife-crime, MRSA and bird flu have all made people more anxious, which in turn is having an impact on the economy.
Government figures show 800,000 more people in the UK now suffer from anxiety disorders than in 1993, taking the total number of sufferers to above seven million.
Such a predominance of fear and anxiety is contributing to the economic crisis because emotion overrides logical thinking, according to the Mental Health Foundation (MHF) study.
"Individuals and institutions - keen to protect themselves - are now too afraid to lend, spend and invest, despite the fact that these actions could assist in ending the recession," it said.
Women were twice as likely to feel anxious and frightened than men, while young people were more likely than the older generation to be fearful.
A third of all people said fear had prevented them from doing things they want, but efforts to calm the public's fears over issues such as crime often have the opposite effect, the study found.
"Social policy aimed at controlling risk and quelling fear often seems to increase it," the report said.
"The UK Government has recently focused on tackling 'fear of crime', but measures based on installing visible signs of 'security' such as CCTV cameras appear to be counter-productive - they don't lead to people feeling safer.
"Creating visible signs of security may make some people more fearful, as they sense high security must mean high risk."
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