Anxiety - A definition

Doctor Daniel Pine defines anxiety as fear and apprehension about dangers that are not immediately present. Over time, anxiety can lead to depression.

When we talk about anxiety we usually talk about a bunch of different emotions that people experience and all these emotions relate to how people feel when they are faced with danger. So, when we talk about fear, we usually mean how people feel when they confront an immediately present danger. So, for example, let us say that you were walking in the woods and you came upon a snake – that would be fear or a fear response. When we talk about anxiety, we talk about dangers that are not so immediately present. So, for example, if you were going to be taking a test maybe in a week, the feelings of apprehension that you would feel for a long time long before the test – we talk about those as anxiety. But in general, all the terms – fear, anxiety, and apprehension – usually refer to the emotions that people experience when they are confronted by danger or threatening things. So, everybody feels anxiety in some situations or fear in other situations. When we talk about problems with anxiety we mean experiencing anxiety that is more than what most people usually experience, and that is important because people who tend to have problems with anxiety, when we follow them overtime, tend to also develop problems with depression.