Extreme or irrational fear or dislike of anything new or unfamiliar.
‘Shyness - the human equivalent of neophobia - can be detected in infants as young as 14 months.’
‘It has also been shown that birds may reject novel prey on the basis of unfamiliarity alone or neophobia.’
‘To measure neophobia, she filled a dish with peanuts and apples, a treat that she calls ‘the Amazon equivalent of chocolate,’ then dangled an unfamiliar object above it and timed a bird's delay in approaching.’
‘To compare object neophobia between populations, a second experiment using a similar protocol and the same individuals as in the prior experiment was conducted.’
‘It would also be necessary to determine if their sensitivity to habitat modification is related to neophobia or simply to the inability to learn a novel resource.’
‘And it leads me to think that the notion of queer used here is strongly associated with neophilia and neophobia, ie degree of attraction to novelty.’
‘To illustrate this point, assembled hacks would be encouraged to try new things, and would thus experience this neophobia first hand.’
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