Peter was 2 years and 10 months old when we began to study him. He was afraid of a white rat, and this fear extended to a rabbit, a fur coat, a feather, cotton wool, etc., but not to wooden blocks and similar toys.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
From the test situations which were used to reveal fears, it was found that Peter showed even more marked fear responses to the rabbit than to the rat.
Peter's fear of the animals which were shown him was probably not a directly conditioned fear.
I'm deathly afraid of rats.
I still find it quite easy to find my way into a child's imagination. We're all Peter Pan ourselves in some respects. Everybody should keep some grip on childhood, even as a grownup.
Once I found a mouse under my bed in an apartment in Paris. I am terrified of mice! I couldn't sleep for days.
The thought of eating rabbit and squirrels doesn't appeal to me. And that was on our table quite often as a kid. In your uppity restaurants, they serve a lot of rabbit. But I just can't help but think of Peter. And deer, I can't go there, because of Bambi.
Rodents can come across as being quite vacant in the personality stakes.
Animals of all classes, old and young, shrink with instinctive fear from any strange object approaching them.
He was scarcely then a year old, and knew so little of herding that he had never turned a sheep in his life; but as soon as he discovered it was his duty to do so I can never forget with what anxiety and eagerness he learned his different evolutions.
I had mice that I kept as pets when I was very young, and I've always liked the way they look. Even rats. I'm not scared of them.