Social phobia, also known as Social Anxiety Disorder, is a type of anxiety disorder in which a person has an extreme fear of social situations. This fear stems from the fear of being criticized, watched, and judged by others. Social phobia comes in two forms. The common type is common if the fears involve many social situations, and the uncommon type if they only involve certain situations (eg signing in front of others, attending a birthday, speaking in a large group).
People who have to speak about someone in public can get really excited and feel these bodily symptoms before speaking. Sometimes the fear can turn into a panic attack. In such a situation, such fears have the opposite effect and many social situations are thus avoided.
Daily life is also badly affected. When these types of fears turn into a recurring pattern, social phobia exists.
Social Phobia Symptoms
When it comes to social phobia, people avoid such environments because they are afraid of being in social environments. Although they are generally aware that the fear is unfounded, the fears persist. Examples of this are the following situations:
- chat with someone
- attend birthdays
- Drinking coffee in a group
- Eating with others at a restaurant
- Giving a public speech
- Working while someone is standing next to you
- be the focus of attention
- Express your opinion in the group
When they know that they are going to enter the (social) environment they fear, they often become very frightened even beforehand. They try to avoid such environments by using various excuses. When they cannot escape, they pass through such environments with intense fear. The complaints are so severe that they negatively affect daily life.
In addition, as in other anxiety disorders, physical symptoms are encountered in social phobia. Physical anxiety symptoms such as flushing, trembling, sweating, and sometimes even panic attacks are common.
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Patients with social phobia are particularly afraid of criticism from others or being ridiculed in social situations. They think very negatively about themselves. For example, they may fear that they will be thought of as lying when they blush, or that they will be thought of as an alcoholic when they tremble.
Symptoms of social phobia in brief
- Intense anxiety to social situations
- avoiding social situations
- Symptoms of anxiety such as confusion, palpitations, sweating, tremors, flushing, muscle tension, heartburn, and diarrhea
Social Phobia Effects
Since social fear and avoidance can be experienced from an early age, the presence of social phobia affects the development of the person. It is often seen that the functions of the patients at school, work, social life and even at home are seriously disrupted. For this reason, many patients with social phobia have not completed their education or work in a job with a lower education level. Patients with social phobia can be very lonely. They no longer dare to go to their birthdays, invite anyone, attend courses or do team sports. It is also known that those with social phobia have a higher celibacy rate, leave their parents later, and have sexual problems more frequently than others. However, living as well as possible with these complaints requires more energy. This can lead to stress and exhaustion.
Social Phobia Treatment
Treatment of social phobia has a positive effect on most patients; that is, fear and avoidance behavior decrease. Depending on the symptoms and severity of the disorder, treatment consists of cognitive behavioral therapy, medication, or a combination of the two.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy applied by our psychologist is an effective therapy for social phobia. Depending on the patient’s problems, a treatment package can be created:
Discussing fearful thoughts
A person with social phobia has unrealistic thoughts (cognitions). For example: “They will think I am a thief because I blush”. The patient is asked to question these unrealistic thoughts (“To what extent do you know that when you blush during a conversation, the person you are talking to thinks you are lying?”).
In this way, the idea that blushing is weird becomes a matter of debate, as the patient explores what most people think about blushing. Maybe he doesn’t find it strange when someone else’s face turns red, and he imposes more severe conditions on himself than others.
If the patient does not find other people’s blushing strange, he or she may eventually get a more realistic and less frightening thought instead (“Frying my face during an interview can mean a lot to the other person. Maybe it’s not even noticeable at times. I can even make a joke about it. How though it takes a short time and goes away on its own.”)
Exercise program
Such an exercise program is called “exposure in vivo,” and it means exposure to the fearful situation. Patients learn to cope with the situation they fear with steps that start from easy and gradually get harder. This treatment method consists of the principle that if the patient does not escape from the feared situation, the fear decreases.
“Focus on homework” exercise
It has been determined that people with social phobia focus their attention on themselves rather than the person in front of them or what is happening around them in social environments. In this exercise, the patient learns to focus his attention on his surroundings with increasingly difficult exercises.
