Fear of mice of both in vivo and in vitro desensitization during treatment. It is also helpful to encourage patients to experience some positive associations with mice: thus, the feared stimulus is paired with the positive rather than being continuously reinforced by the negative. An exaggerated, phobic fear of mice and rats has traditionally been depicted as a stereotypical trait of women, with numerous books, cartoons, television shows, and films portraying women screaming and jumping onto chairs or tables at the sight of a mouse – for example, Mammy Two Shoes in "Tom and Jerry". Despite the gender-stereotype portrayal Western murophobia has always
The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was their wedding, the boy's continuing complaints annoyed his wife to no end. Reaching her wits' end, she sent for a bucketful of stream water, complete with gudgeons. She tossed the freezing water onto her husband while he was asleep. As he awoke, shuddering, he exclaimed that while he had finally learned to shudder, he still did not know what true fear was. The fairy tale is based on a tale from the German state of Mecklenburg and one from Zwehrn in Hesse, probably from Dorothea Viehmann, as told by Ferdinand Siebert from the area of the Schwalm. In the first