Sources & claims ledger

Every load-bearing claim on this site traces to a row here: the claim, the source, and when we verified it. Claims we could not source to an authoritative origin are simply not made — the second table lists the important ones.

Claims we make, and their sources

• Specific phobia prevalence: 9.1% of U.S. adults past-year; 12.5% lifetime; 12.2% female / 5.8% male past-year; impairment split 48.1% mild / 30.0% moderate / 21.9% serious — NIMH, Specific Phobia statistics (NCS-R), retrieved 2026-10-28.
• Definition: specific phobia is an intense, irrational fear of something posing little or no actual danger, with severe anxiety even at the thought of facing it — NIMH.
• Clinical framework: the plain-language summary of the DSM-5-TR specific phobia picture (marked fear, immediate response, avoidance/endurance with distress, disproportionality, ~6-month persistence, impairment, exclusion) — American Psychiatric Association, DSM-5-TR (2022); ailurophobia classified within specific phobia, animal type.
• Exposure therapy as principal / treatment-of-choice: ADAA treatment-types pages; Merck Manual Consumer Version, "Specific Phobias"; Choy, Fyer & Lipsitz (2007), Clinical Psychology Review 27(3), 266–286.
• Graded, repeated exposure structure; hierarchy/SUDS planning inside therapy: ADAA exposure-therapy description; Merck Manual progression example; standard CBT literature as reviewed in Choy et al. (2007).
• One-session format exists in the literature: Öst (1989), "One-session treatment for specific phobias," Behaviour Research and Therapy 27(1), 1–7.
• VR exposure studied for ailurophobia specifically: randomized clinical trial of VR vs. metacognitive therapy for ailurophobia, BMC Psychology (2025) — cited as "studied," never as a result promised to any reader.
• Avoidance maintains phobias; acquisition routes (conditioning, vicarious, informational): Eaton, Bienvenu & Miloyan (2018), "Specific phobias," The Lancet Psychiatry 5(8), 662–675; Choy et al. (2007).
• Crisis routing: 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline — call or text 988, free, 24/7 (SAMHSA / 988 Lifeline); Crisis Text Line — text HOME to 741741, 24/7. Verified 2026-10-28.
• Operator: Neat Circle LLC, PA DOS #0006896991, 924 W 23rd St, Erie, PA 16502 — program entity-assignment record, 2026-10-28.

Claims we deliberately do NOT make

• No ailurophobia-specific prevalence. No authoritative source we could verify publishes one; anyone quoting you a precise "% of people fear cats" is inventing precision.
• No treatment success rates addressed to you. Study populations are not you; the site states what clinicians use, never what it will do for a reader.
• No diagnosis — of you, ever. The reflection tool returns words, not a score or a finding.
• No named medications, doses, or recommendations.
• No clinician involvement. None exists today; the guide is pending independent clinical review and is labeled exactly that way.
• No testimonials or outcome stories. None are published, because none have been collected under any verifiable process.

Our accuracy process re-checks these sources on a schedule; a source that moves or is retracted makes the affected claim a red item until the page is corrected. The internal ledger (with verification methods) lives with the venture's records.