The role of dispositional reinforcement sensitivity and self-esteem in social interaction anxiety and social phobia

Abstract

Social anxiety is related to normal variation in personality and manifests as anxiety concerning interactions with others (social interaction anxiety), and/or as a fear of social scrutiny whilst performing tasks when under observation from others (social phobia). In revised Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (rRST) a behavioral inhibition system (BIS) facilitates defensive approach behaviors and anxiety in situations of uncertainty. A fight-flight-freeze system (FFFS) facilitates fear and avoidance behaviors, and a behavioral approach system (BAS) facilitates anticipated reward and/or approach-based behaviors. rRST suggests that a socially anxious phenotype would experience elevated BIS sensitivity, elevated FFFS sensitivity, and dampened BAS sensitivity. We used self-report measures to test if the effects of social interaction anxiety and social phobia (which reflects the fear of social scrutiny) are separable within rRST, as in rRST anxiety and fear are separate constructs. Low levels of self-esteem are a risk factor for social anxiety, thus we tested how two sub-components of self-esteem referred to as self-acceptance and self-assessment predict social interaction anxiety and social phobia. 405 participants (mean age = 30.6; 86% female) completed the online study. Social interaction anxiety and social phobia were positively correlated with BIS and FFFS-flight sensitivity, and were negatively correlated with BAS, and FFFS-fight sensitivity in males and females. Social interaction anxiety and social phobia were negatively correlated with self-acceptance in males and females. Multiple regression showed that for females BIS and FFFS-flight scores were prominent positive predictors of social interaction anxiety whereas BIS was a prominent positive predictor of social phobia. For males the FFFS-fight subscale was a prominent negative predictor of social interaction anxiety. Overall, a synthesis of the present study and previous studies suggests that there may be subtle differences in how trait social interaction anxiety and trait social phobia relate to reinforcement sensitivity.

Personality, self-appraisals, and body conscious emotions as predictors of symptoms of body dysmorphia and restrictive disordered eating

“…Body dysmorphic disorder is highly comorbid with social anxiety disorder, and treatment protocols for the two disorders can be similar (Fang & Hofmann, 2010). Anorexia nervosa is also characterized by elevated levels of social anxiety (Kerr-Gaffney, Harrison, & Tchanturia, 2018), and trait social interaction anxiety and trait social phobia share a positive zero-order correlation with BIS sensitivity (du Rocher & Warfield, 2022). Therefore, future studies might benefit from testing whether the correlations between BIS sensitivity and body dysmorphia, or BIS sensitivity and an-orexia nervosa, differ in participants with high levels of these subtypes of trait social anxiety relative to participants with low levels of these subtypes of trait social anxiety.…”

Social interaction anxiety, social phobia, and cognitive control: controlled reactions to facial affect during an emotional face flanker task

“…Self-report studies have reported zero-order correlations showing that both trait social interaction anxiety and trait social phobia are positively correlated with BIS sensitivity, FFFS-flight/freeze sensitivity, and negatively correlated with BAS sensitivity and FFFS-fight sensitivity (e.g., du Rocher & Warfield, 2022;Gomez et al, 2022). Although a comparison of multiple regression analyses across different studies can show inconsistent results concerning which reinforcement sensitivity is the most prominent predictor of SIAS or SPS scores (e.g., du Rocher & Warfield, 2022; Gomez et al, 2022;Kramer & Rodriguez, 2018), these analyses do suggest that the rRST measures can explain a moderate amount of variance in both SIAS scores, and SPS scores.…”