Until the late 1970s most regulatory bodies in the medical professsion grouped all anxiety and panic-related disorders loosely together as neuroses. Panic attacks had begun to be recognized, during the sixties, as being triggered by something other than general chronic anxiety, but panic disorder did not become recognized as a specific condition until 1980. Agoraphobia was not even considered as being linked to anxiety disorders until the late 1980s.

Back in 1865 these conditions referred to, until then as nervous exhaustion, became classified as neurasthenia. By the end of the nineteenth century, Sigmund Freud was using the term anxiety neurosis but it was not until 1926 that he stopped attributing it to sexual repression, upon realization the that anxiety was the cause of such repression rather than the result, and concluded that the various types of anxiety were all forms of separation anxiety and, as such, reproductions of the trauma of birth.

Between then and the late 1970s, when fears and phobias finally began to be scrutinized more extensively, various theories were put forth. Alfred Adler attributed the cause of anxiety to feelings of insecurity, Abraham Maslow to a fixation on the need for safety which, in turn, prevented the achievement of selfhood, Carl Jung to fear of awareness of self. The Neo-Freudians were more introspective, citing internalized conflict and the subsequent failure of defence mechanisms.

It was not until the 1990s that great advances were made, among them recognition of anxiety disorders in children. It was probably the original Freudian tradition of anxiety neurosis stemming from sexual tension that is the reason for problems of anxiety in children being either trivialized as something-they-will-grow-out-of or hypothersized as being the result of parental abuse for so many years. Two discoveries ended all the psychological theorizing on the causes of anxiety disorders, and enabled us to better understand their origins, by proving them to be biologically based. Serotonin levels were proven to impact upon mood, and the amygdala, part of the limbic system of the brain, was shown to be the brain's fear conditioning centre.

Today, cognitive-behavioural and exposure therapies, as well as medications, are continually being improved upon because brain chemistry, memory programming and the genetics involved in anxiety disorders are so much closer to being understood. Whether as an adult or as a child, being the victim of an anxiety disorder is hardly pleasant but the health professions are now on their way to being able to correctly diagnose treatable anxiety/panic/phobic conditions. We've come a long way in a short time from the inappropriate and exacerbating talk therapy of just a few years ago.

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There's also lots of information on children's anxiety and how to help in this FREE eBook from Native Remedies.