Being “in” or “out” of the game: subjective and acoustic reactions to exclusion and popularity in social anxiety

Abstract

Social Anxiety (SA) has been shown to be associated with compensatory deficits in pro-social behavior following exclusion and with failure to capitalize on social success. We assessed the subjective and expressive responses of high (n = 48) and low (n = 56) socially anxious individuals to exclusion, acceptance, and popularity induced by a participation in an online ball-tossing game. Before the manipulation, participants read aloud neutral and command utterances. Following the manipulation, participants rated their mood and cognitions and re-read the utterances. Acoustic properties (fundamental frequency–mF0, vocal intensity) of these utterances were analyzed. We found greater differences in self-esteem between high and low socially anxious individuals following the exclusion condition, as compared to the acceptance condition. Among low socially anxious individuals, exclusion promoted increased vocal confidence, as indicated by decreased mF0 and increased vocal intensity in uttering commands; High socially anxious individuals exhibited an opposite reaction, responding to exclusion by decreased vocal confidence. Following popularity, high SA was associated with decreased enhancement in mood and self-esteem in women but not in men. Consistent with evolutionary and interpersonal accounts of SA, we highlight the importance of examining the effects of SA and gender on events indicating unambiguous and unanimous social acceptance. Examining reactivity to changes in belongingness may have important implications for understanding the core mechanisms of SA.

“Speaking More than Words”: Classifying Men with Social Anxiety Disorder via Vocal Acoustic Analyses of Diagnostic Interviews

“…Taken together with previously-reported findings (Galili et al 2013;Gilboa-Schechtman et al 2014;Laukka et al 2008;Weeks et al 2012), these data in their totality suggest that mean F0 emitted in response to social threat and over periods ranging as long as 10 min provides an objective and valid index relevant to social anxiety symptomatology. Collectively, the present and previous results present an informative overview of speech acoustic-related tendencies characteristic of SAD.…”

“…The latter possibility could be attributed to a variety of factors, ranging from sociocultural context to menstrual cycle effects upon vocal pitch (e.g., see Boone et al 2010). In addition, it is worth noting that previously-reported post-pharmacotherapy decreases in state anxiety in SAD patients were accompanied by corresponding decreases in mean and maximum vocal pitch, and this clinical sample included women (Laukka et al 2008); moreover, both Galili et al (2013) and Gilboa-Schechtman et al (2014) found that mean F0 related positively to social anxiety symptoms for both men and women in unselected samples. Thus, examination of the moderating factors of the documented (albeit less consistent) relation between increased vocal pitch and SAD in samples of women remains an important area for future research.…”

“…Furthermore, the link between mean F0 and social anxiety may be context-dependent. Among highly socially anxious individuals, a manipulation of social exclusion was associated with increased mean F0 in uttering commands (GilboaSchechtman et al 2014); by contrast, and similar to findings by Weeks et al (2011), low socially anxious individuals exhibited an opposite reaction, responding to exclusion with decreased mean F0 (Gilboa-Schechtman et al 2014).…”

Automated assessment of psychiatric disorders using speech: A systematic review

“…Many studies found a significant increase in mean f0 in social anxiety disorder 58,[86][87][88] and generalized anxiety disorder, 89 with some studies finding null results. 88,90 This was the highest score for mean f0 across disorders (see Figure 3).…”

Automatic analysis of speech F0 contour for the characterization of mood changes in bipolar patients

“…The same subject-specific behaviour was observed in [26] were F0 average level, jitter and F0 standard deviation were considered. As a possible confirmation of this hypothesis, in [40] the authors suggest that some vocal parameters, for example F0, can be used as objective markers of Social Anxiety.…”