Chapter 17 - Social Anxiety, Positive Experiences, and Positive Events

Abstract

When there is an opportunity to engage in an activity that can generate positive experiences, people with emotional disturbances might be expected to be less successful than other people. Despite the appeal of this formulation, there is reason to believe that attenuated positive experiences are only relevant to a selective number of disturbances. This chapter discusses recent advances in the phenomenology of social anxiety. This includes data showing that social anxiety is associated with low intensity, short-lived positive experiences, infrequent positive events, and distinct cognitive biases that restrict the quality of life. For decades, psychologists have advocated a single, bipolar continuum with positive emotions and approach behavior at one endpoint, and negative emotions and avoidance behavior as the other endpoint. However, recent research in personality, motivation, and social neuroscience suggests that there are two separate biobehavioral systems that reflect very different purposes. Specifically, on the one hand, there is an avoidance system whose purpose is to prevent people from being exposed to danger. To meet this aim, behavior that might lead to pain, punishment, or other undesirable outcomes is inhibited. On the other hand, independent from the avoidance system, there is an approach system whose purpose is to guide people toward situations that might offer rewards. To meet this aim, attention and energy are mobilized to pursue activities that can generate resources such as food, the cooperation of others, sexual partners, and knowledge that provides an evolutionary advantage for survival and reproduction.