The relationship of teasing in childhood to the expression of gelotophobia in adults

In observations from clinical practice, the origin of gelotophobia, the fear of being laughed at, was traced back to traumatizing experiences of being laughed at in childhood. Because gelotophobia is assumed to be mediated by a personal sense of shame, this hypothesis was tested using a group of gelotophobes (N = 99), a shame-based clinical group (N = 103), a non shame-based clinical group (N = 166), and normal controls (N = 495). While gelotophobes and the shame-based group reported having had more traumatizing experiences than the normal controls and the non shame-based group, their intensity and frequency did not explain individual differences in the fear of being laughed at for gelotophobes and the shame-based group.