What is it?

Social anxiety is the fear of social situations that might result in being judged negatively by others.

This may be limited to very specific situations or by specific people, but it will have a negative effect on their life.

What does it feel like?

Usually, people will worry about social situations before and during them, then analyse them afterwards, believing they did something wrong or others responded to them in a negative way. In social situations, people may blush, sweat, shake, stumble over words or have their mind go completely blank”; they may over prepare for situations or avoid them entirely to reduce the opportunity for being judged or embarrassed. 

Potential therapy options

Usually the best treatment options for this difficulty are based around increasing your knowledge of the problem, having a better understanding of your thinking, and making some changes to your behaviour.  The evidence suggested cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is usually the most effective treatment.  We have a number of interventions that use CBT to help people overcome this problem including SilverCloud online CBT, the Stress and Mood Management course, and some of our one-to-one CBT-based interventions.

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