Low Social Anxiety Group Research Articles

Emotionally Aversive Cues Suppress Neural Systems Underlying Optimal Learning in Socially Anxious Individuals.

Learning and decision-making are modulated by socio-emotional processing and such modulation is implicated in clinically relevant personality traits of social anxiety. The present study elucidates the computational and neural mechanisms by which emotionally aversive cues disrupt learning in socially anxious human individuals. Healthy volunteers with low or high trait social anxiety performed a reversal learning task requiring learning actions in response to angry or happy face cues. Choice data were best captured by a computational model in which learning rate was adjusted according to the history of surprises. High trait socially anxious individuals used a less-dynamic strategy for adjusting their learning rate in trials started with angry face cues and unlike the low social anxiety group, their dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) activity did not covary with the learning rate. Our results demonstrate that trait social anxiety is accompanied by disruption of optimal learning and dACC activity in threatening situations.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Social anxiety is known to influence a broad range of cognitive functions. This study tests whether and how social anxiety affects human value-based learning as a function of uncertainty in the learning environment. The findings indicate that, in a threatening context evoked by an angry face, socially anxious individuals fail to benefit from a stable learning environment with highly predictable stimulus-response-outcome associations. Under those circumstances, socially anxious individuals failed to use their dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, a region known to adjust learning rate to environmental uncertainty. These findings open the way to modify neurobiological mechanisms of maladaptive learning in anxiety and depressive disorders.

음악이 사회불안 대학생의 대인거리에 미치는 효과

본 연구는 높은 사회불안 수준과 낮은 사회불안 수준을 가지는 대학생들 간 대인거리의 차이가 나타나는지, 음악이 대인거리에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지 알아보고자 하였다. Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS)과 사회적 상호 불안 척도(Social Interaction Anxiety Scale, SIAS)를 실시하여 낮은 사회불안 집단(n=25)과 높은 사회불안 집단(n=25)을 선정하였다. 대인거리는 Comfortant Interpersonal Distance (CID) 과제를 사용하여 세 가지 조건, 즉 음악을 듣지 않는 조건, 긍정적 및 부정적 음악을 듣는 조건에서 측정되었다. 음악을 듣지 않은 조건에서 높은 사회불안 집단이 낮은 사회불안 집단보다 유의하게 더 먼 대인거리를 보였으며, 음악 조건×집단 간 상호작용 효과가 관찰되었다. 음악조건에 따른 집단 간 대인거리의 변화를 살펴본 결과, 음악이 없는 조건과 비교하여 긍정적 음악조건에서는 사회불안이 높은 집단에서만 대인거리가 유의하게 감소된 반면, 부정적 음악조건에서는 두 집단 모두에서 더 먼 대인거리가 관찰되었다. 즉 높은 사회불안 집단이 낮은 사회불안 집단에 비하여 더 먼 대인거리를 유지하고, 긍정적 음악이 높은 사회 불안 집단에서 대인거리를 좁히는 효과를 가지고 있음이 관찰되었다. 이 결과는 긍정적 음악이 사회불안의 완화와 대인관계 향상에 유용하게 적용될 수 있음을 시사한다.

Predictors of Biased Self-perception in Individuals with High Social Anxiety: The Effect of Self-consciousness in the Private and Public Self Domains.

“Biased self-perception,” the tendency to perceive one’s social performance as more negative than observers do, is characteristic of socially anxious individuals. Self-attention processes are hypothesised to underlie biased self-perception, however, different models emphasise different aspects of self-attention, with attention to the public aspects of the self being prominent. The current study aimed to investigate the relative contribution of two types of dispositional self-attention; public- and private self-consciousness to biased self-perception in a high (n = 48) versus a low (n = 48) social anxiety group undergoing an interaction task. The main finding was that private self-consciousness explained substantial and unique variance in biased negative self-perception in individuals with high social anxiety, while public self-consciousness did not. This relationship was independent of increments in state anxiety. Private self-consciousness appeared to have a specific association with bias related to overestimation of negative social performance rather than underestimation of positive social performance. The implication of this finding is that current treatment models of Social anxiety disorder might include broader aspects of self-focused attention, especially in the context of formulating self-evaluation biases.

The Relationship between Parenting Styles and Adolescents' Social Anxiety in Migrant Families: A Study in Guangdong, China.

Previous studies indicated that parenting styles were important influencing factors for the development of children’s well-being. It is known that mass migration to the cities in China will affect family relations. However, few studies focused on the relationship between parenting styles and adolescents’ mental health in migrant families. Thus, this study aimed to investigate how parenting styles could affect adolescent’s social anxiety in migrant families. A total number of 1,345 adolescents in migrant families from four non-government-funded junior middle schools in Guangdong province formed the research sample. Parenting styles were measured using short-form of the Egna Minnen Beträffande Uppfostran, and social anxiety was evaluated using Social Anxiety Subscale of Self-Consciousness Scale. The results showed that emotional warmth, overprotection and rejection were significantly more often perceived from mothers than from fathers. Significant group differences between high social anxiety group and low social anxiety group were found in both father’s rearing styles and mother’s rearing styles. Furthermore, in migrant families, paternal emotional warmth could decrease adolescents’ social anxiety, whereas maternal overprotection could increase it.

Overestimation of the Subjective Experience of Time in Social Anxiety: Effects of Facial Expression, Gaze Direction, and Time Course.

It is known that threatening stimuli increase emotional arousal, resulting in overestimating the subjective experience of passing time. Moreover, facial expressions and gaze direction interact to create socially threatening situations in people with social anxiety. The present study investigated the effect of social anxiety on the perceived duration of observing emotional faces with a direct or an averted gaze. Participants were divided into high, medium and low social anxiety groups based on social anxiety inventory scores. Participants then performed a temporal bisection task. Participants with high social anxiety provided larger overestimates for neutral faces with an averted gaze than those with low social anxiety in the second half of the task, whereas these differences were not found for angry face with direct and averted gaze. These results suggest that people with social anxiety perceive the duration of threatening situations as being longer than true durations based on objectively measured time.

Electrocortical Evidence of Enhanced Performance Monitoring in Social Anxiety

Self-focused attention is thought to be a key feature of social anxiety disorder. Yet few studies have used event-related potentials (ERPs) to examine whether socially anxious individuals display greater monitoring of their performance and attention to their errors. Similarly, only a few studies have used ERPs to examine how social anxiety is related to processing of performance feedback. Individuals with high (n=26) and low (n=28) levels of social anxiety completed a trial-and-error learning task. Self-focus was manipulated using false heart-rate feedback during a random subset of trials. Performance feedback was given using emotional and neutral faces in a positive context (correct=happy face; incorrect=neutral face) and negative context (correct=neutral face; incorrect=disgust face) in order to investigate biased interpretation and attention to feedback. Socially anxious subjects displayed enhanced amplitude of the ERN and CRN, suggesting greater response monitoring, and enhanced Pe amplitude, suggesting greater processing of errors relative to the low social anxiety group. No group differences were observed with respect to feedback processing. Before learning stimulus–response mappings in the negative context, the FRN was larger for self-focus compared to standard trials and marginally larger for socially anxious subjects compared to controls. These findings support cognitive models and suggest avenues for future research.

Predicting socially anxious group membership using reinforcement sensitivity theory

The present study examined the role of revised reinforcement sensitivity theory (r-RST; Gray & McNaughton, 2000) in discriminating individuals with high and low levels of social anxiety. Participants were solicited online via Amazon's MTurk and completed measures of social anxiety and reinforcement sensitivity theory. Participants were divided into low versus high social anxiety groups based upon recommended cut off scores. A logistic regression analysis using the r-RST subsystems as predictors was able to successfully classify 88.3% of participants into social anxiety groups. More specifically, the Freeze component of the Fight–Flight–Freeze system and the behavior approach system both emerged as significant predictors of group membership. Implications of these results for the understanding of social anxiety in the context of revised reinforcement sensitivity theory are discussed.

Updating the emotional content of working memory in social anxiety

Background and objectivesCognitive accounts suggest that information processing biases have an important role in the etiology and maintenance of social anxiety (SA). Empirical evidence support this notion has been established in variety of cognitive domains. Yet, it is still not known how social anxious individuals process emotional content in working memory (WM). Maladaptive WM updating may influence emotion regulation and anxiety during social situations in SA. Thus, the aim of the present study was to explore biases when updating emotional content in SA. Methods31 participants with high SA and 34 control participants performed an emotional 2-back task. Biases were assessed by intrusion cost in reaction times, which reflects the conflict between the inhibition of irrelevant content and the activation of relevant content. ResultsResults revealed a diminished intrusion cost in reaction times for irrelevant positive content in the high, but not in the low SA group. No differences were found for negative or neutral content. LimitationsIn the present study we used an analogue sample of students with high SA rather than a true clinical sample. Further research is needed to examine WM updating in clinical population. ConclusionsThese findings suggest that individuals with SA are better at inhibiting irrelevant positive information, a maladaptive cognitive bias that may prevent positive feedback from entering the cognitive system. This cognitive bias in WM may play a role in the etiology and maintenance of SA.

Socially Anxious Tendencies Affect Autonomic Responses during Eye Gaze Perception

Social anxiety disorder is a common psychiatric disorder. The gaze of others is known to frequently induce social anxiety. We conducted a gaze detection experiment to examine the effects of social anxiety on autonomic response, namely heart rate (HR) response. We used the maximum HR deceleration between 0 s and 3 s after stimulus onset as an indicator of emotional stress. Participants were assigned to a high social anxiety (HSA) or low social anxiety (LSA) group on the basis of cut-off scores indicative of clinical levels of stress as per the Japanese version of the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS-J). Our results showed that HR deceleration was greater for the HSA compared with the LSA group. Moreover, the higher the LSAS-J score was, the greater the increase was in HR deceleration (correlation coefficient rs = 0.52, p < 0.01). Our results suggest that the eye gaze of others can be processed as a threat in individuals with a high tendency towards social anxiety.

Ansiedad social consumo riesgoso de alcohol en adolescentes mexicanos

The study of social phobia is gradually increasing, arguing association between social phobia and multiple measures of dysfunction. After institutional approval, and in accordance with the ethical principles required for social research, socio-demographic data, measurements of social anxiety and alcohol consumption pattern, were obtained from 3164 Mexican adolescents volunteers (men and women) ages 12-18 years (x¯=14.7, SD 1.7), in different school schedule (morning or afternoon) and with record of their extracurricular activities” (to participate or not in sports, arts and been involved or not in a dating relationship). The participants were divided into two groups, according to the score on the Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents: high (n = 524) (x¯=44.2, SD=5.7), and low (n = 2640)(x¯=25.9, SD=5.8), degree of social anxiety. Also, their levels of alcohol consumption were compared. The results of the study showed that: In contrast to the suggested by the literature in adults, the pattern of alcohol consumption in adolescents of low social anxiety group and the high social anxiety group, did not presented statistically significant differences (X2 = 1.201, gl=2, p=.361). A likely explanation of these reported differences in drinking among socially anxious and not socially anxious adults, is that they occur only in certain variants of social phobia, or maybe, it requires other mediating variables between social phobia and alcohol abuse.

Social anxiety, acute social stress, and reward parameters interact to predict risky decision-making among adolescents

Risk-taking behavior increases during adolescence, leading to potentially disastrous consequences. Social anxiety emerges in adolescence and may compound risk-taking propensity, particularly during stress and when reward potential is high. However, the manner in which social anxiety, stress, and reward parameters interact to impact adolescent risk-taking is unclear. To clarify this question, a community sample of 35 adolescents (15–18yo), characterized as having high or low social anxiety, participated in a study over two separate days, during each of which they were exposed to either a social stress or a control condition, while performing a risky decision-making task. The task manipulated, orthogonally, reward magnitude and probability across trials. Three findings emerged. First, reward magnitude had a greater impact on the rate of risky decisions in high social anxiety (HSA) than low social anxiety (LSA) adolescents. Second, reaction times (RTs) were similar during the social stress and the control conditions for the HSA group, whereas the LSA group's RTs differed between conditions. Third, HSA adolescents showed the longest RTs on the most negative trials. These findings suggest that risk-taking in adolescents is modulated by context and reward parameters differentially as a function of social anxiety.

When Facebook is easier than face-to-face: Social support derived from Facebook in socially anxious individuals

While the psychological benefits of social support are well-established, it is also clear that for many socially anxious individuals, engaging with face-to-face social networks is problematic. This research examined whether social support derived from an online social network (Facebook) had incremental value in predicting subjective well-being over and above offline social support in socially anxious and non-socially anxious individuals. Individuals with high (N=105) and low (N=194) social anxiety completed measures of perceived social support, perceived social support derived from Facebook, and subjective well-being. For the high social anxiety group, Facebook social support explained a significant amount of additional variance in subjective well-being, with offline social support failing to contribute significantly to the model. For the low social anxiety group, Facebook social support did not explain any variance in well-being over and above offline social support. Possible implications of the utility of Facebook for socially anxious individuals are discussed.

Reactions to Teasing in Social Anxiety

The combination of challenge and humor inherent in teasing creates an ambiguous situation that can either increase bonding or create tension in a relationship, depending on how the teasing is interpreted. Although it is well established that individuals with social anxiety interpret ambiguous social situations negatively, no research has examined how individuals with social anxiety react to and interpret teasing. Ninety undergraduate students with high (n = 56) and low (n = 34) levels of social anxiety read vignettes depicting teasing scenarios, and rated how they would feel and behave in the situations. Participants also completed a self-report measure of recalled childhood teasing. Compared to the low social anxiety group, participants in the high social anxiety group reported that they would experience more negative affect in response to the teasing scenarios, and interpreted the teasing scenarios as more malicious and mean-spirited. As well, participants in the high social anxiety group reported being more likely to change the behavior that was the focus of teasing (e.g., changing the way they dress if the focus of teasing was their outfits) compared to participants in the low social anxiety group. Recalled childhood teasing partially mediated group differences on negative affect and behavior change in response to the teasing scenarios. The present results are consistent with the information processing bias literature and have implications for the social functioning of individuals with high levels of social anxiety.

Time-Course of Attentional Bias for Positive Social Words in Individuals with High and Low Social Anxiety

Although accumulating research demonstrates the association between attentional bias and social anxiety, the bias for positive stimuli has so far not been adequately studied. The aim is to investigate the time-course of attentional bias for positive social words in participants with high and low social anxiety. In a modified dot-probe task, word-pairs of neutral and positive social words were randomly presented for 100, 500, and 1250 milliseconds in a nonclinical sample of students to test their attentional bias. Non-significant interaction of Group × Exposure Duration was found. However, there was a significant main effect of group, with significantly different response latencies between the high social anxiety (HSA) and low social anxiety (LSA) groups in the 100 ms condition, without for 500 or 1250 ms. With respect to attentional bias, the LSA group showed enhanced preferential attention for positive social words to which the HSA group showed avoidance in the 100 ms condition. In the 500 ms condition, preferential attention to positive social words was at trend in the LSA group, relative to the HSA group. Neither group showed attentional bias in the 1250 ms condition. These findings extend recent research about the attention training program and add to the empirical literature suggesting that the initial avoidance of positive stimuli may contribute to maintaining social anxiety.

Stress Reactivity, Social Anxiety, and Alcohol Consumption in People With Alcoholism: A Laboratory Study

Objective: Social anxiety may maintain alcohol dependence through increased reactivity to stressful events, a propensity to drink to cope with stressful events, or both. The current study is a secondary analysis of an existing data set that examined differences between individuals with alcohol dependence and concurrent high and low social anxiety in objective and subjective stress reactivity to a laboratory stressor (Trier Social Stress Test [TSST]), as well as consumption of alcohol following the stressor. Methods: Forty participants with alcohol dependence (20 women) were randomly assigned to the TSST condition as part of the parent study. Post hoc analysis of social anxiety measures yielded high (n = 19) and low (n = 21) social anxiety groups. Participants completed the TSST, followed by a small dose of their favorite alcoholic beverage (target blood alcohol concentration 0.03 g/dL) to prime subsequent laboratory drinking. Participants received a sham beer taste test of 2 glasses (710 mL total) of beer. Differences between high and low social anxiety groups were assessed via subjective and objective (mean arterial pressure, serum cortisol) reactivity to the TSST and consumption of alcohol during the taste test (total mLs consumed, mLs/kg of body weight, and likelihood of consuming all the beer available). Results: No differences emerged in either objective or subjective measures of stress reactivity between high and low social anxiety groups. There were also no differences between social anxiety groups in amount of alcohol consumed during the taste test. Conclusions: No differences were observed between high and low social anxiety participants with concurrent alcohol dependence on stress reactivity or alcohol consumption following a stressor. Given that all participants in this study had alcohol dependence, negative results may suggest that heightened stress reactivity and drinking to cope are more relevant to the development of alcohol dependence and that other factors may maintain alcohol use once dependence has developed.

Influence of social stress on risk-taking behavior in adolescents

Risk-taking behavior involves making choices with uncertain positive or negative outcomes. Evidence suggests that risk-taking behavior is influenced by emotional state. One such emotional experience is social anxiety, which has been related to both risk-avoidant and risk-seeking decision making. The present study examined a community sample of 34 adolescents grouped into low (Low SA Group) and high (High SA Group) social anxiety (SA). Both groups were compared on changes in performance on a risk taking task (Balloon Analogue Risk Task) between a social threat condition (modified Trier Social Stress Test, High Stress) and a control condition (Low Stress). These conditions were administered on different days, and the order was counterbalanced across subjects. A group×condition interaction revealed that the High SA Group showed greater risk-taking behavior when exposed to the High Stress Condition compared to the Low Stress Condition, while the Low SA Group evidenced no difference between the two conditions. Interpretations for the increased risk behavior under the condition of social stress for those high in social anxiety are discussed as well as implications for understanding the complex relationship between social anxiety and risk behavior.

Post-Evaluative Biases Toward Somatic Stimuli and Cardiovascular Responses in Social Anxiety

Cognitive models of social anxiety emphasize the role of an attentional shift toward cues related to somatic state in social anxiety. We examined attentional biases to somatic cues and cardiovascular reactivity in response to a social evaluative task. Participants performed an impromptu speech during which they received standardized negative evaluative comments. Participants then completed a dot-probe task with social evaluative, somatic, and anger-related words. Blood pressure (BP) and heart rate (HR) were assessed in 1-minute intervals during baseline, the speech task, and the dot-probe task. Despite the fact that a high social anxiety group reported higher levels of anxiety, high and low social anxiety groups did not differ in their speech task-evoked BP or HR responses. Furthermore, the high social anxiety group, compared to the low social anxiety group, exhibited greater attentional biases to somatic words, suggesting greater attention directed toward information pertinent to somatic arousal.

Anticipation of Social Interaction Changes Implicit Approach-Avoidance Behavior of Socially Anxious Individuals

Earlier research has revealed implicit avoidance of social stimuli in social anxiety (SA). This study investigated such reactions in anticipation of social interaction. High (n = 24) and low (n = 22) SA females were assessed in anticipation of a getting-acquainted conversation (anticipation) and in a no-conversation-expected (neutral) condition. The Face-Turn Approach Avoidance Task was used in which participants responded to profiles of human faces or control stimuli by either pulling (approach) or pushing (avoidance) a joystick. Upon pulling, the stimuli turned toward the participant, while they turned away upon pushing. The results demonstrated the expected decreased approach response to faces in the neutral condition for the high SAs compared to the low SAs group. Unexpectedly, in the anticipation condition the high SAs showed increased approach tendencies to faces whereas, the low SAs demonstrated a decreased approach response. The implicit social approach response of the high SAs in the anticipation condition is discussed.

Information processing bias against emotional facial expressions in social anxiety

The present study examined whether information processing bias against emotional facial expressions is present among individuals with social anxiety. College students with high (high social anxiety group; n = 26) and low social anxiety (low social anxiety group; n = 26) performed three different types of working memory tasks: (a) ordering positive and negative facial expressions according to the intensity of emotion; (b) ordering pictures of faces according to age; and (c) ordering geometric shapes according to size. The high social anxiety group performed significantly more poorly than the low social anxiety group on the facial expression task, but not on the other two tasks with the nonemotional stimuli. These results suggest that high social anxiety interferes with processing of emotionally charged facial expressions.

Implicit and Explicit Associations in the Fear Structure of Social Anxiety

Summary.-Implicit associations in the fear structure of social anxiety were investigated and their relations with explicit associations were examined in the present study. The Implicit Association Test was used to assess implicit associations. Individuals scoring High (n = 26) and Low (n = 18) on Social Anxiety completed two forms of the Implicit Association Test and rated the probability and cost of negative social outcomes. Analyses showed an implicit association between anxiety responses and negative evaluations was more strongly formed in the High Social Anxiety group than in the Low Social Anxiety group. Furthermore, relations between implicit associations and explicit measures were minimal. These findings suggested that the Implicit Association Test is suitable for the assessment of implicit associations in the fear structure of social anxiety, and that implicit associations of social anxiety are relatively independent of explicit associations.