Models Of Social Phobia

There are many different reasons for social phobia, but there are some specific behavioral models that have been used to describe specific phobic behaviors. With cognitive models of social anxiety, people suffering from the disorder are afraid of how they will be viewed by others.

In addition, after encountering others in what most would view as “neutral” or even “positive” ways, such as a brief, but “positive” social interaction, people who have social phobia nonetheless tend to obsess and ruminate over what they did wrong, and how they “performed” badly.

They also tend to remember negative events much longer and in much more detail than truly positive events. They tend to dismiss truly positive interactions while obsessing over negative events, either real or imagined.

The cognitive behavioral model of social phobia is the most popular and focuses on cognitive behavioral therapy to help control social phobias.

This includes immersion, in which sufferers are gradually confronted and then must deal with situations that began as “mild” concentrations with their fears, and escalate to the most severe.

In this way, patients learn that they can deal with any situation that comes up, so that their confidence increases. As this happens, patients gradually learn to change their behavior, so that even in stressful situations, they may not exhibits symptoms at all.

If they do exhibit symptoms, they are much less severe, and continued therapy can ultimately to alleviate them in the most successful cases.

Even for people who still must deal with some social anxiety after therapy, therapy still greatly decreases both their dependence on medication and increases their functioning in life.

In fact, many can go throughout their day without much more than insignificant anxiety, so that they can lead almost completely normal lives.

Social phobia can also be treated with medication in tandem with cognitive behavioral therapy.

It is generally not advised to only use medication without behavioral therapy, because medication does not provide lasting changes by itself.

However, with the introduction and the use of behavioral therapy, patients can often be completely weaned off medication eventually.

The most popular medications to use the social will be our other benzodiazepines, with some use of antianxiety medications, usually in tandem, as well. Patients can be given anti-anxiety medications or in some cases, can be given beta-blockers to help further alleviate anxiety.

Some famous people who have had social phobia include Barb Streisand, who has had stage fright so severe that it stopped her from performing live performances for an extended period of time.

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