trypophobia

English

WOTD – 28 November 2017

From Ancient Greek τρῦπα (trûpa, “hole”) +‎ -phobia (from Ancient Greek φόβος (phóbos, “fear, phobia”)), said to have been coined by a blogger from Ireland in 2005.^[1]

Lua error in Module:parameters at line 229: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "RP" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA^(key): /ˌtɹɪpəˈfəʊbi.ə/
Lua error in Module:parameters at line 229: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "GA" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. enPR: trĭ'pə-fōʹbē-ə, IPA^(key): /ˌtɹɪpəˈfoʊbi.ə/
Rhymes: -əʊbiə
Hyphenation: try‧po‧pho‧bia

trypophobia (uncountable)

(psychology) An irrational or obsessive fear of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes, such as those found in honeycombs. [from 2005]
- 2013 October, G[eoff] G. Cole, A[rnold] J. Wilkins, “Fear of Holes”, in Psychological science, volume 24, number 10, →DOI, [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23982244 ��PMID], pages 1980–1985:
  Images of lotus seed heads are often reported as inducing trypophobia. Sufferers of trypophobia report that it is the visual percept that is particularly aversive.

fear of holes

^ “Louise” (2005 May 23) “Trypophobia”, in A Phobia of Holes, Yahoo! GeoCities‎^[1], archived from the original on 16 March 2009: see Jennifer Abbasi (2011 July 26) “Is Trypophobia a Real Phobia?: We Investigate the Fear of Creepy Clustered Holes”, in Popular Science‎^[2], archived from the original on 12 September 2017.