Risk profiles of social anxiety for interpersonal difficulties in a sample of Spanish adolescents

Abstract

Social anxiety has been widely studied over the past four decades. However, limited attention has been given to the relationship between social anxiety and interpersonal difficulties during adolescence. Adolescents exhibiting symptoms of social anxiety (SA) may also face challenges in their interpersonal interactions at school. This study aimed to identify distinct profiles of adolescents with social anxiety and examine whether these profiles differed in terms of the severity of their interpersonal difficulties (ID). A random cluster sampling was performed. The sample comprised 1,685 Spanish students (49.0% female) from 15 to 18 years old (M = 16.28, SD = 0.97). Participants completed the Spanish version of the Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents (SAS-A) and the Questionnaire About Interpersonal Difficulties for Adolescents (QIDA). Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) revealed four social anxiety profiles: mild SA, moderate SA, severe SA, and extreme SA. Multivariate analyses (MANOVA) indicated statistically significant differences in interpersonal difficulties across the four clusters with effect sizes between d = 0.23 and d = 0.91. The mild SA profile showed the lowest mean scores in interpersonal difficulties whereas the extreme SA profile showed the highest ones. Intervention strategies are suggested as preventive or corrective measures to support adolescents who fall in high-risk profiles.