The study titled "Fear of Holes," by Geoff G. Cole and Arnold J. Wilkins, found that up to 15% of people (18% of females and 11% of males) become viscerally upset after looking at images of clustered holes or bumps.
"Trypophobia is more akin to disgust than to fear," Wilkins told Business Insider in 2015. "The disgust is probably an overgeneralisation of a reaction to possible contaminants."
"The disgust arises from clusters of objects, and these objects are not necessarily holes, despite the name trypophobia," Wilkins continued.
Sources: Sage, Business Insider
The same study featured a quote from a trypophobe describing a triggering episode:
"[I] can't really face small, irregularly or asymmetrically placed holes, they make me like, throw up in my mouth, cry a little bit, and shake all over, deeply."
Sources: Sage, Business Insider
"There may be an ancient evolutionary part of the brain telling people that they are looking at a poisonous animal," Cole said in a 2013 press release.
"The disgust we feel may well give us an evolutionary advantage, even if we don't know it consciously, because it sends people with trypophobia running as far as possible from the holey-looking thing," Jennifer Welsh wrote for Business Insider in 2015.
Sources: Sage, Business Insider
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