Oversensitvity to emotional stimuli

It takes less to stimulate the emotions of someone with panic disorder. People with panic disorder are much quicker than the average person to feel sadness, anger, hurt, rejection, or loneliness. They are also more prone to feeling excited, joyful, elated, passionate, or affectionate.

Besides feeling emotions more readily, people with panic disorder are more likely to feel emotions throughout their entire bodies (which is why they have panic attacks). In addition to being overly sensitive to their own emotions, they are also highly sensitive to the emotional states of others.

High levels of imagination and creativity

Most panic disorder sufferers have powerful minds that are highly imaginative and creative. This can be a blessing or a curse. Imagination and creativity are both great virtues, but with panic disorder the ability to create powerful visual images of dreadful possibilities can really work against you.

Most people with panic disorder can come up with an infinite number of negative possibilities to worry about in a given situation. They can also imagine a catastrophic event (like having a panic attack) in a feared setting so vividly that they can start to hyperventilate because the imaginary experience feels so real.

Rigid thinking

Panic disorder sufferers tend to perceive most everything in extremes and absolutes. They tend to classify everything (people, circumstances, events, etc.) as right or wrong, black or white, good or bad, fair or unfair.

Panic disorder sufferers also have a strong tendency to think in terms of what "should" or "must" be according to their own pre-conceived, often unrealistic and rigid expectations. Many psychologists and authors refer to this as “should/must thinking.” When people with panic disorder experience something to be different from how they think it "should" be, they are highly prone to becoming anxious or upset.

High need for approval

People with panic disorder are usually people pleasers. Because they usually have a low sense of self-worth, they often rely on the approval of others to feel valuable or significant.

Sensitivity to criticism/ fear of rejection

This excessive need for validation by others makes people with panic disorder extra-sensitive to criticism and can lead to an extreme fear of rejection.

Feelings of overresponsibility for others.

In most cases, panic disorder sufferers also have trouble saying no and will do anything to avoid conflict or confrontation for fear of losing others' approval. Their high need for approval combined with high levels of sensitivity often results in undue feelings of responsibility for other people's problems and feelings.

Perfectionism

Panic disorder sufferers commonly set unrealistic expectations for themselves and then fear not living up to them. Because they are people pleasers, they also worry about meeting the expectations they perceive others have set for them. Since they consider anything less than perfect a failure and they have an extreme fear of failure, their constant striving for perfection causes them a lot of extra worry, stress, and anxiety.

Need for control

Panic disorder sufferers often have a high need for events to be predictable and to be able to exert large amounts of control over their environment or circumstances. In many cases, they even feel the need to control the feelings and behaviors of others. They live in fear of losing control and after the onset of panic disorder, feel a lot of anxiety over hiding their condition to appear as if they are in control to others.