For some reason, people consider social anxiety to be even less serious than depression; while depression is a magical kick for everyone, there is too much kick for a person with social anxiety, even if it seems to be too much. And if you can't make a phone call or come over and ask something... you're not even weak... or even lazy. One person told me that these people are just "pretentious whimsicals. Many children can do all this without any difficulty. And why draw attention to yourself like that? You have to call, call and don't wring your hands. Do not call? So you don't have to.
The average person regards this disorder as a shameful and petty weakness, which can be overcome at the click of a finger. After all, what can be easier than handing over the money for travel, pay for the apartment, go to the neighbors and say that they are pouring in your new repairs? Here, just go and say it! And it's just a shame not to be able to make such simple steps in life.
It is indicative that not only strangers do not understand a person with social anxiety. He does not understand himself and feels shame for his terrible vice and inability to fit into society. Such people consider themselves ugly in different ways. Someone thinks they are afraid of the person who is a soul and who is a soul and who is a... anything that throws him away from society forever.
Yes, it is so dramatic. What for a part of the population seems to be a domestic action, for a person with sociophobia a daily feat. Given that few people understand why this is happening, I will tell you more about sociophobia.
It is not yet clear why sociophobia arises. There is an opinion that has not yet been confirmed by research that there is a genetic predisposition to it. In families where one of the parents suffers from this disorder, the risk of its development in children is higher. No separate genome of sociophobia has been found. But it has already been proven that people who are prone to anxiety disorders share some common genetic traits. However, it is now believed that sociophobia is formed on the basis of negative experience gained during a lifetime. As for the alarming genes, they can simply be the basis for the development of social anxiety. Parents, on the other hand, can provide a child with an example of avoidant behaviour in society, which simply takes hold over time.
The style of upbringing in some families greatly contributes to the development of sociophobia. This is a child's constant shame in the face of others or very frequent comparisons with abstract "other children". It is believed that this should have a very stimulating effect on the child in terms of adaptation of activities in the society. Even seemingly benevolent: "Why are you such a boy without friends? Everybody has friends, but you don't," can be the basis for a child to begin to develop a sense of inferiority towards others. An introverted child who does not need a lot of sandbox mates may well think he is abnormal.
School, especially primary and high school classes, very often become a trigger in the development of sociophobia. In the early grades, the teacher is a "harmful factor" ("stand up and show all your classmates a diary with two, let it be a shame"), and in older classes. At the same time, sociophobia is formed not because of imagination and cognitive disorders, but because of the experience of social exclusion.
How quickly is sociophobia formed? For a small child, this may be an isolated case. For a young adult, 2 months of experience of social exclusion.
The brain of a "sociophobe" reacts to people who need to communicate differently. They have increased blood flow in their frontal cortex (processing information from the outside) and tonsils (causing fear and anxiety). In addition, people with social anxiety react to rejection experiences and unsuccessful communication by activating the pain system. That is, at the moment when society repels someone with this disorder, he feels real pain.
All this is expressed in a certain type of behavior and perception of reality.
Thus, it has been established that people suffering from sociophobia are selectively attentive to negative social signs and signs of rejection by others. Signals of acceptance are ignored, and the neutral behavior of others is regarded as ignoring or even hidden aggression.
People with social anxiety care how they are treated. They suffer from their isolation. For this reason, from time to time they gain courage and throw themselves into the crowd of people around them as if they were an embrasure. At this moment, "sociophobes", in order to overcome fear, first of all, cut off any sensitivity to social signals. And, as a rule, they fly too far into other people's borders and are repulsed by those around them. Sometimes the society's response can be very negative, because they regard a person's actions with social anxiety as aggression.
What happens in the end? The colossal tension to overcome the fear of rejection and the brutal kickback of society is, in fact, the punishment for trying. When will a "sociophobe" decide to take a new march? Probably not soon.
Given the high levels of stress and pain, these experiences have led people to develop cognitive (behavioral) strategies rather quickly. They aim to create a style of behaviour that avoids society. For example, their empathy for others is decreasing. Empathy without feedback is painful, so it is better to reduce it to a minimum. People stop feeling that the people around them are interesting, they start to think that they are talking nonsense and talking about stupid topics.
It should be noted that people around them often do this. People don't have to exchange important information all the time. There are many social "games" where people simply demonstrate those same empathic connections and psychologically stroke each other. You can discuss the prices of chicken legs, or you can be interested in the salad recipe only to say "we have the same problems and interests" or "I care about you, I appreciate your experience, I care about your life". Gossip, by the way, is also a social game, but more damaging than discussing chicken legs.
This is all becoming uninteresting to a man with sociophobia. He begins to exclude himself from social games, and from the outside, they will seem pointless to him. Normally, other people do not always play everything that society offers them or observe game rituals. And they may feel that they are in an inappropriate society. But these situations do not cause them mental pain and feelings of otherness or rejection.
Another cognitive impairment is the generalization and globalization of one's experience. In fact, a person's experience of social anxiety is small. For the reasons described above, they have infrequent breakthroughs in the depths of society. But on these negative events they make a clear decision about society and themselves. "I will always be alone", "nobody will love me", "nobody is interested in me". Well, and therefore, why join society? They are all "people as people, and I am a skeleton of barbed wire" (c). "I have nothing to do there.
"Sociophobists" often "read" a lot of other people's thoughts. So they are sure that people around them consider it pathetic and flawed. Besides, they "know" that "all normal people do not have that" in their lives. That they are all loved, full of life and happy. That makes people with social anxiety in their own eyes even more inakovsky in the wrong direction and unhappy.
It is noteworthy that people with social anxiety more often and more quickly form some kind of dependence, which reduces the level of this experience. These are different types of eating disorders, alcohol, cyber addiction and gambling. The latter two are particularly common because the computer provides a safe communication surrogate.
In addition, people with socio-phobia often have lower levels of control, especially when it is possible to get closer to the community through actions or objects. For example, they may buy something insanely expensive and vivid to be noticed and told that they are accepted.
People with social anxiety appear at least once in their lives for consultations. There is a certain cohort that visits specialists a lot and often. But they also very often and quickly leave the consultations. As to go for help for them is also a serious action, they want a quick panacea, which will solve all problems in two sittings. And not to go anywhere else. The problem of socioformations requires a long and painstaking processing and from the client requires more perseverance and willingness to tolerate a certain number of negative experiences. To the greater pain that they already have, people are not only not ready, but also actively avoid it. As soon as a consultant starts "throwing rods" in the direction of developing tactics of communication with people (because without it there is no way), the client quickly finds reasons to stop consultations. So, those who are going to psychotherapy about this disorder should understand that they will face their own serious resistance.
As for everyone else. If there is a person with social anxiety around you, it is worth considering that your daily actions against him/her can bring him/her serious negative feelings.