Fear of the dark in children: is stationary night blindness the cause?

Fear of the dark is a common complaint of pre-teenage children. 1 2 It should not be confused with night terrors or panics, in which a child becomes acutely agitated and terror-struck at night, appearing to be awake while in fact asleep and unable to be woken. 3 4 In contrast, fear of the dark can be experienced by the conscious child in dimly lit or dark conditions. When such fear is excessive it is often attributed to attention seeking behaviour or assumed to be an irrational fear that will abate with time.