ABSTRACT
The words fear and nervousness designate two mental conditions so much akin to each other that perhaps we should more rightly say that they represented two different sides of but one attitude of mind. The predominant feature in "fear" is the thought of the object that is the cause of the emotion, whilst nervousness is of a more subjective nature, and exists already before its conscious connection with certain external conditions. Fear is referred to objective circumstances: things, people, occurrences, conditions which an effort is made to avoid. Real acquired fear is a favourite stock example in psychological textbooks to explain the formation of association between perceptions and emotions. E. Wexberg also calls attention to a further connection of nervous fear with conscious desire of self-assertion; by his timidity the child manages to become the tyrant of those around him.
