02/15/15
011634517
Social Anxiety Disorder
According to the WebMD (Medical reference) website on the Social Anxiety Article (2014), a social anxiety disorder or social phobia is defined as “an anxiety disorder in which a person has excessive and unreasonable fear of social situations. This Anxiety (intense nervousness) and self-consciousness arise from a fear of being closely watched, judged, and criticized by others” (“What is Social Anxiety Dirsorder”p.1). As stated in the Social Anxiety Article, there are various symptoms such as avoiding social events, feeling a great amount of anxiety in social situations, and feeling shaky, tense/heart beating fast, which correspond to having social anxiety disorder (“What …show more content…
The Social Anxiety Disorder section from the upenn.edu website states that some of the symptoms of people who have social anxiety disorder avoid social situations in which they have to face other people since they feel that everyone around them is judging them (“Social Anxiety Disorder” Common Symptoms section para. 2). This can relate back to the social cognition, which involves expectations we have about the social world. In this case, people with social anxiety disorder expect that people are automatically judging them in every given social situation they are …show more content…
For example, confidence would fall under your self-agency, which relates to social anxiety disorder because you tend to think other people are thinking negatively of you if you think negatively of yourself. Similar to the Beat Social Anxiety section from the Psychology solution website which mentions that a low self-esteem leads to thinking that other people think you are not valuable as a human being as well (“Beat Social Anxiety” Negative Self Evaluation Section para. 1). We have to remember that we are not mind readers, so we cannot pre determine what other people may be thinking about us. One of the ways this disorder can be treated is through Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) which is the most effective way to treat so the individual does not have to be on medication (“What is Social Anxiety Disorder?” p.3). This relates back to one of the perspectives on mental disorders under identity and mental health notes, which happens to be the CBT perspective, which involves setting up action plans to develop new ways to