Francis was frightened by a clown at his birthday party when he turned six years old. At the age of eight he still becomes highly anxious when he sees any type of clown and responds by throwing a tantrum and crying excessively. He displays a phobic avoidance of any type of clown (even Ronald McDonald) and refuses to go anywhere where he might see a clown. He would most likely receive DSM-IV diagnosis of:

Specific phobia

Explanation:

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th Edition, Text Revision gives a classification of recognised mental health disorders in the form of DSM-IV codes. The fear of clowns is described as a specific phobia with a code of 300.29.A specific phobia is a fear that lacks a reason or rational against an exposure to a certain object or situation.Such specific phobias can leads to a disability in normal life as people suffering from such phobias tend to avoid situations where they may encounter such phobias. The fear of clowns is known as Coulrophobia which is a type of specific phobia when it interferes with the normal functioning and is persistent.Since Francis becomes anxious upon seeing a clown since he was 6 years old and the fear persists and he avoids going to places where he sees clowns, he has specific phobia against clowns.