People with social anxiety come across better than they might think, study finds

https://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/27665.aspx

November 11, 2014
By Gerry Everding

Making friends is often extremely difficult for people with social anxiety disorder and to make matters worse, people with this disorder tend to assume that the friendships they do have are not of the highest quality.

The problem with this perception, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis, is that it’s not necessarily true from the point of view of their friends.

“People who are impaired by high social anxiety typically think they are coming across much worse than they really are,” said study co-author Thomas Rodebaugh, PhD, associate professor of psychology in Arts & Sciences. “This new study suggests that the same is true in their friendships.”

The study, published this month in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, finds that people with social anxiety disorder often overestimate how bad their relationships are with friends, when compared to what the friends say.

Much more than simple shyness, social anxiety disorder is a recognized psychiatric condition in which those struggling with the affliction often live in fear of meeting new people, passing up social invitations or work opportunities for fear of being rejected, embarrassed or otherwise singled out as a failure.

By some estimates, 13 percent of people in Europe and the United States experience social anxiety disorder. The disorder ranges in severity, from less severe, yet impairing fears of a single situation (most often public speaking), to fears about interacting with people in general.

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“People with social anxiety disorder report that their friendships are worse, but their friends didn't see it the same way,” Rodebaugh said. “Their friends seem to say something more like: ‘It's different, but not worse.’ ”

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The findings could play an important role in helping people with social anxiety disorder understand that their friendships may not be as terrible as they might imagine. Helping people form friendships is in itself important, because many studies confirm that the lack of strong social networks can leave people vulnerable to a host of problems, including disease, depression and even earlier mortality, Rodebaugh said.

The good news is that social anxiety disorder is treatable. Decades of research suggests that talk therapy, such as cognitive behavioral treatment, is as, or even more, effective than medications for long term treatment of the disorder.

“Current treatments focus, in part, on helping people with social anxiety disorder see that they come across better than they expect they will,” Rodebaugh said. “Our study suggests that’s true for specific friendships as well.”

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