That is one reason I got out of it. I saw that my fellow researchers didn’t feel the same way at all and something was amiss in me. I treated the rats well during the experiments and did everything properly but I really could not stand them. I don’t feel too much like a deviant however. Some people’s job is killing rats and other vermin.
I don’t think there’s anything irrational about a fear of rats. They can bite. They scurry. They are stealthy. They sneak in and live in your home. Plus, they’re big. And can be aggressive.
We were sitting on the couch, watching TV, and a dark shape ran from the kitchen into the den beyond the living room.
Irrational fear? I think both my husband and I screamed. And he’s like 260 pounds of manly-man.
Knowing there’s a rat in your house, eating, peeing, and pooping on your stuff and getting into your food…
Okay, I’ve got the shudders under control.
After two rats in the house, both of us are not afraid of them so much as repulsed by them. Unnerving.
Bloody big they are, and bloody fast. Anyway, the traps got them.
Now we’ve had a few wee mice, also not permitted to share the abode, but those don’t bother me quite as much. Cuter, smaller, I suppose, though they also bite, pee, poop, sneak, and get into our food. They get trapped, too.
So, I’m not really afraid of rats, more that I am repulsed by them.
Oh man, I loves me some ratties.
They’re cute, they’re smart, they’re fastidiously clean given the option, they’re like little dogs, without the annoying parts about little dogs.
That having been said, I did have a mouse dart across my kitchen the other day and I shrieked like a leetle girl. It startled me, okay? 
I don’t want rodents living in my house uninvited, because of the damage they do when left to their own devices, and I have killed many, but I’d feel pretty live-and-let-live about Mr. R. norvegicus hanging out in a vacant lot or whatever.