If you’re like me, that picture will make you start identifying all the anatomical errors.
This was fun. I found a paper about developing an arachnophobia scale, a questionnaire that someone could use to evaluate a person for arachnophobic tendencies, title Questionnaire Dimensions of Spider Phobia, by Watts and Sharrock. I figured I’d breeze through it, see that I’m clearly an arachnophile, and get a good laugh. Except…I think I would personally mess up their metrics. I’m apparently some weird outlier.
But I’m not. You know who is weird? These people.
In the cognitive domain a distinction emerged between those who were very vigilant for spiders, constantly scanning for them. Generally visual scanning was predominant. but one pilot S claimed also to use her senses of smell and hearing to detect spiders. She frequently lay awake listening for them. For others, cognitions about spiders took the form of distressing internal preoccupations. They felt haunted by spiders, imagined them vividly and often dreamed about them. They tried to think about spiders as little as possible.
Anyway, so I pulled up their questionnaire and quickly realized it’s not appropriate for typical people — you know, the kind who love spiders.
Their questions are organized into a couple of reasonable categories: vigilance, preoccupation, and avoidance/coping. So first, let’s see if you’re vigilant about spotting spiders.
Do you check the lounge for spiders before sitting down?
Yes. You wouldn’t want to sit on one and crush it.
Do you ever make plans in case you come across a spider?
Yes. I’m often intentionally planning to find spiders.
Do you sometimes look at the corners of the room for spiders?
Yes. Also the walls, ceiling, and floor.
When watching television, would you notice a spider crawling across the floor elsewhere in the room?
Yes.
Do you check the bedroom for spiders before going to sleep?
No, not really. I’m usually looking forward to a good night’s sleep.
Would your mind be a lot easier if spiders didn’t exist?
Sick! No! Spiders are an important part of the ecosystem!
Are you always on the lookout for spiders?
Yes.
Have you a “plan for action” in case you find a spider in the kitchen?
Of course. I have capture vials stored in the kitchen.
Do you make very certain there are no spiders around before taking a bath?
Why? Am I shy?
Do you sometimes sense the presence of a spider without actually seeing it?
Yes. The most tell-tale signature is seeing silk threads.
If there’s a spider in the house. are you the most likely person to find it?
No. Mary has a very good eye.
Can you spot a spider out of the corner of your eye?
Yes, if one is there.
The next category is preoccupation, like whether you are obsessed with spiders. I’m not going to do well here.
Do you sometimes dream about spiders?
Yes.
Do you think a lot about spiders?
Yes. And what’s wrong with that?
Do you worry more about spiders than most people?
Definitely. I worry about the health of the spider population all the time — for instance, the grass spiders appear to be late in their annual appearance. I hope they’re OK.
When you imagine a spider, can you see parts of it in great detail?
I am very familiar with spider anatomy, so yes.
Do you ever find yourself thinking about spiders for no reason?
Not for no reason.
Do you sometimes find it an effort to keep thoughts of spiders out of your mind?
Why would I make that effort?
Do you often think about particular parts of spiders for example the fangs?
I’m more of a palps man, myself.
Are you sometimes distracted by thoughts of spiders?
Never distracted.
Are you sometimes haunted by thoughts of spiders?
Weird choice of words…no, not haunted.
When watching television do you think more about the danger of there being a spider in the room than about the programme?
It is not dangerous to have a spider in the room.
Have you had nightmares about spiders?
No. Do you have nightmares about beautiful women (or men) jumping into bed with you?
The next block of questions are about how you cope when you see spiders.
Can you deal effectively with spiders yourself when you find them?
Yes.
Do you get other people to get rid of spiders when you find them?
“Get rid of”? Why?
Would you know how to cope with spiders in the bath?
Put your hand down, lift them out, set them free.
Do you sometimes use a book or a newspaper to deal with a spider?
Spiders can’t read and are uninterested in human news.
Do you feel a lot more secure if someone else is in the house in case you come across a spider?
The someone else is probably more dangerous than the spider.
When you find a spider in a room, would you avoid going in that room until someone else had removed it?
There are spiders in every room. Avoiding them would require going outside, and there are even more spiders there.
Would you get help if you came across a spider?
Help to do what?
If you find a spider in the bath, would you, say, use a shower to wash the spider down the plughole?
Sadist. Hell, no.
If you discover a spider in the room, do you leave the room straight away?
Why?
Would you think about using a broom to deal with a spider in the kitchen?
That’s useless. Small paintbrush, and a cup.
Cognitive/behavioral items!
When imagining a spider, is it always the same one or kind?
I know an awful lot of kinds of spiders.
Do you ever lie in bed at night and listen out for spiders?
No. They are very, very quiet.
If you thought you saw a spider would you go for a close look?
I usually do.
When you see a spider. does it take a long time to get it out of your mind?
No, because it is then a permanent resident of my memory palace.
Are you slightly scared to enter a room, say a bathroom, where spiders have been in the past?
Ridiculous. Spiders have been and will be in every room.
Another category is factual knowledge. These are stupid. Of course I know the answers to these questions.
Are spiders insects?
Do spiders have SIX legs?
Are spiders solely meat eaters?
Have you a good idea whereabouts spiders are likely to appear?
Do you know when (what time of year) you are likely to come across a spider?
They don’t provide a scoring sheet or answer key, you’ll just have to decide for yourself if you feel arachnophobic.
Yikes. My lovely spouse is so arachnophobic that she would feel extremely uncomfortable even taking the quiz. I couldn’t even make her aware of the quiz or describe it to her. Me, I’m a very live and let live person with arthropods of all sorts, unless they get into my shoes or are competing with me for food or something, and they they gotta go. But the spouse makes me disappear the spiders. I capture and release when I can, but sometimes, for the sake of expediency, …
“Do you check the lounge for spiders before sitting down?”
I try, but the bartender keeps hanging up on me.
Do you ever make plans in case you come across a spider?
Me, an intellectual: Welp, I gotta be ready to rescue the poor, foolish thing so, yeah!
LOL.
I knew long ago, a biology professor who had a severe fear of spiders.
He couldn’t even look at a spider picture in a book without panicking.
One day, an undergraduate brought in a large spider in a jar and asked him to identify it.
He just told him no and asked him to put the spider in a trashcan which he put outside the door in the hallway.
A few hours later, the janitor walked by and said, “Hey, who put a garden spider in the trash can.”
Summed up a lot of things. Professor can’t even look at a spider much less identify it. But the janitor knew what it was right away.
there are these:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagheera_kiplingi
spiders, that eat mostly vegetation-sourced food, but it’s a unusual situation for everyone involved…
As to hearing and smelling?
Can you hear one of those Australian Huntsman spiders when they run/jump? Do any spiders have a noticeable smell? maybe if they have a messy web/midden?
Yesterday I found a large spider building a web in my living room. Using a paper towel and an extendo-grabber (which I normally use to get cans out of the top shelf of my cupboards without having to get a stepladder) I relocated it to the bush outside my kitchen window. I’m sure that there’s more food for it out there.
“If you find a spider in the bath, would you, say, use a shower to wash the spider down the plughole?”
I once stepped into the shower, closed the shower curtain, only to find a spider the size of my hand on the curtain, 5cm in front of my nose. I must admit that freaked me out a bit, but washing it down the plughole wasn’t an option… it wouldn’t possibly fit.
We go to some length to protect spiders. If they get in the tub, they get rescued. The only thing I don’t like about spiders is the webs get messy look.
The only arachnids I don’t like are ticks. We have a lot of those in the garden.
seems like a lot of leading questions to me.
I will admit to being startled by spiders when find them in unexpected places, unexpected places are pretty uncommon these days however. The last few years I have encountered a rather large centipede that looks like a large gliding mustache moved very fast first time I saw one it freaked me out some what now it is just beautifully interesting. I live in urban north america stray dogs and skunks are way more dangerous.
PZ is of course joking. The proposed questionnaire construction is to see how arachnophobes think about spiders, not to determine whether one is archnophobic, and to show the differences between (I quote) “phobics and normals”.
Me, I don’t like ticks or mites, but I am a , FWTW.
Mostly meh regarding spiders.
—
cf. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0005796784900615
Questionnaire dimensions of spider phobia
Abstract
The construction is described of a questionnaire designed to measure separate dimensions of cognitive-behavioural responsiveness to spiders in spider phobics. Dimensions of vigilance, preoccupation and coping-avoidance are established. Data are presented on differences between phobics and normals on the questionnaire, on correlations between the questionnaire measures and avoidance test measures, and on the effects of desensitization on the questionnaire measures.
[I do think PZ is showing the difference between philiacs and normals]
I’ve read that house spiders should not be put outdoors because they’re adapted to living inside, so I generally relocate them someplace within my apartment.
Steve, if they’re adapted to living inside (a house), then they are perforce adapted to their environment.
That is, hey live in a huge cavernous place with gigantic creatures who will swat them whenever they notice them (pronoun games!) but with many nooks.
(So many people confuse populations with individuals!)
Oh, behave!
Re: It is not dangerous to have a spider in the room.
Going to bed one night I folded back the sheets and there was a very aggressive male Sydney funnel web spider doing its classic threat display.
I’m usually shoving a cat out of the way if I want to sit down anywhere, so, yes, I’m checking pretty much anywhere I plan on sitting.
The cats usually notice spiders first. The pricked ears and butt wiggle let me know that they’ve found something of interest.
The cats usually have that covered. If not, an overturned cup and some newspaper or cardboard is usually adequate for relocation purposes.
Why does that spider illustration have 10 legs? And what look to be multiple sets of antennae?
“There are spiders in every room. Avoiding them would require going outside, and there are even more spiders there.”
Are you trying to get the arachnophobes to just curl up in the fetal position and surrender, PZ?
My home has a distressing spider shortage at present. I know because I have an excessive number of small flies that have invaded. I need about twenty or so to move in and spin their lovely webs to make this place more livable, but I think my cats have scared them off. :(
That seems like a useless arachnophobia scale for a problem that does not need to be scaled anyway (by which I mean, it would serve no obvious purpose in psychotherapy that could not be achieved by simply asking if the phobia is improving).
lochaber@5– Huntsman spiders can make a hissing sound by stridulation. I’ve only ever heard it when I’ve cornered one to take it outside and even then the spider usually stays silent, so I can’t imagine many circumstances where you would hear the spider before you saw it.
Wow, some of those questions at the end really seem to insult the intelligence. 6 legs really?
It would be intresting to see the level of knowledge of Americans generally on spiders and see for example who can name different species or at least types. A quiz that showed how muchor littel people actually know would be intresting if perhaps depressing.
@12. Steve Morrison : “I’ve read that house spiders should not be put outdoors because they’re adapted to living inside.”
I dunno ’bout house spiders but I do gather that Australian Huntsmen spiders tend to lack adequate food inside homes and thus slowly starve if not re-located outside where there’s a more plentiful food supply.
@14. hillaryrettig1 : Surely spiders best suit those who like their legs!?
“Do spiders have SIX legs?”
Well having eight total legs requires having six legs. Otherwise they couldn’t reach that total
Also some i find have missing legs
I would probably be a lot more likely to check for spiders if I lived someplace where they are large and/or dangerous. Fortunately central Saskatchewan isn’t one of those places. This is also why I’m unlikely to visit Australia any time soon.
I’m a lot more vigilant for spiders than my arachnophobic husband! Look at the seat before putting my butt on it? Absolutely; the one and only spider bite I’ve ever experienced was when I sat on a jumping spider (I was a teenager wearing shorts, so I felt the stuck-with-a-hot-needle sensation before fully coming to rest, and the spider scurried off as soon as I jumped up), and I don’t want to squish one! Or a wasp or bee, or any other bug.
I especially keep an eye out when gardening. I see little spiders (less than a cm body length) all the time, and they’re frequently carrying egg sacs. I make a point of moving them out of harm’s way unless it’s easy to work around them.
Twice I’ve seen egg sacs in danger, and moved to rescue them. The first one tumbled down with the dirt I’d dislodged and was buried. I looked around for a spider, and saw a good-sized dark brown spider standing very still on the edge of the area. I very delicately picked out bits of dirt until I found the sac, then set it down within reach of the spider. She grabbed it and tucked it under her thorax, then stood looking at me while I scooped up the dirt she was standing on and moved her out of my field of operations. She watched me for several minutes before disappearing.
The second time was when I was getting small rocks out of a tub that was full of water. I’d scooped out the uppermost rocks (those above the surface), and was reaching for underwater rocks when I saw a white ball moving in the murky water. I thought “egg sac?” and reached a hand in to scoop it out, when something grabbed my fingers with a lot of little prickly claws! I froze for a moment, then completed my scooping motion, and came up with a large brown spider clinging to my fingers with all eight. Her leg spread was around three inches! And she did NOT want to let go of my hand. Usually, wandering spiders scurry to get away when I scoop them up, but she held on until I lowered my hand to ground level and parted my fingers under her so that she could see the dry goldenrod stalks underneath. Then she transferred her grip to them, and watched me for a few minutes before moving on. I don’t know if the silk covering protected her eggs from the water well enough, but I hope so!
Both of these spiders looked like they might have been of the same species, and very similar to spiders I’ve seen in my house. Possibly Varacosa avara? The spider reference page I know doesn’t give a lot of information (like size, habits, and how the egg sacs are handled), so I’m not sure, but the photo looks similar. My husband usually squawks and calls on me to remove the critter when he spots one, which I do using a cup and paper. They’re too fast (and sometimes too large) to reliably capture with bare hands without risking injury to the arachnid.
Sometimes I think I should keep a box of collection vials in my gardening equipment, for later ID purposes. There are a lot of different species in my garden!
Saw a beautiful wolf spider in my shed this afternoon. It scurried off before I could see if it was a male or female. My wife thinks I’m weird because I rehome them rather than squish them.
“It scurried off before I could see if it was a male or female.”
:)
(Sexing spiders is not one of my achievements :)