What is social anxiety?
Social anxiety is a difficulty where a person has an intense fear in social situations where they may be scrutinised by others. This fear can be very distressing, and may seem out of proportion to others.
Often, the person is worrying about the judgement from others, and has an image in their mind of how they look, e.g. very red, sweaty, etc.
It can be so intense for the person that they may have to avoid or escape these situations to cope. It may also really affect a person’s personal, social or work life.
What keeps social anxiety going?
Many of us have probably felt anxious in some social situations in our lifetime. This is normal. But why does it seem to be every situation for some people? And why is it so pervasive that it can be a difficulty for the person for months or even years?
CBT is one of the most effective therapies for social anxiety. In CBT, we believe that there are a number of things that keep the social anxiety going. This includes:
- Avoidance – whereby a person avoids an anxiety triggering social situation, which reduces anxiety in the short term, but means they never get to learn that it might be ok, and this makes it hard to go into a similar situation in the future.
- Escape – whereby a person initially attends an anxiety triggering social situation, but has to leave early. Like avoidance, this reduces anxiety in the short term, but means they never get to learn that it might be ok if they stayed, and this makes it hard to go into, or stay in, a similar situation in the future.
- Safety behaviours – are behaviours someone does to stop something bad from happening, e.g. rehearsing conversations ahead of time so that the conversation flows better. However, the person can believe that this is the only reason they coped, and attribute the success to these behaviours, meaning they continue to do them every time. However, they never get to learn it will probably be ok even by not relying on these behaviours.
What can I do to help my social anxiety?
The recommendation is to actually approach situations that you would otherwise rather avoid. Often, it can help to do this in a graded way, i.e. going into social situations that are less daunting to begin with, and work up to the harder ones. Remember, your anxiety will eventually reduce if you stay in the situation long enough, so it will get easier. And the next time you do it, it will feel even easier.
If you’re prone to leaving social situations early, see if you can ride out the anxiety and stay longer. Most of the time we see that it isn’t as bad as we expected.
If you’re engaging with those pesky safety behaviours that we named above, see if you can experiment with not doing these behaviours. How does it feel? Does it actually feel more ‘normal’ and less anxiety provoking – often this can be the case.
How can CBT therapy help me overcome social anxiety?
CBT is the most recommended treatment, and within this therapy you will learn:
- What social anxiety is
- How it keeps going and why it doesn’t stop
- How avoidance, escape and safety behaviours can actually backfire, and make the situation work
- How to focus on the conversation, rather than the image of yourself
- How to approach situations you would previous avoid, with support from your therapist
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