Social Anxiety in the Modern World | Dr. Fallon Goodman | TEDxUSF

Every person who entered our therapy clinic answered a stack of questions before beginning treatment and throughout my years as a therapist there was one question I always reviewed before meeting with a new client: what is your purpose in life defined as a motivation? central vein of life something you are trying to achieve now to be fair this is a difficult question identifying a single purpose in life feels very difficult also feels important many people spend years searching and developing their purposes and some never find it, but usually we see answers like this to be a committed father to make a meaningful change in my community to build a career I'm proud of to live for a long time just keeping it simple but then there was the answer from a young woman I worked with before of meeting me With her, as I always did, I turned to see how she described her purpose and wrote this to prevent other people from noticing.

This young woman, a bright, resourceful, and compassionate high school student, decided that her purpose in life was to make sure other people didn't do it. we know she existed this is the power of

social

anxiety

at its core

social

anxiety

is about the fear of being rejected when we feel socially anxious we become very focused on how we look to others we scan the room for signs of threat and disapproval signals that we might have made a mistake and are at risk of being rejected and then we look for comfort and approval signals smile nod laugh etc., and while social anxiety can be exhausting, it exists for a reason Social anxiety is about protecting us from rejection and it does this by attuning us to the nuances, norms, and dynamics of a social group so that we can adapt our behavior to them and ultimately avoid being rejected.

Now this is a good thing because humans are social, we exist in social groups that we trust. each other, whether we like it or not, but also more simply because rejection is painful, take a moment to think about your own rejection experiences, as embarrassing as we all have them, maybe you were cheated on after a first date, maybe Maybe you got rejected from your dream job. maybe you were kicked out of the unpleasant projection of a group of friends and social anxiety tries to protect us from it, but social anxiety becomes problematic when it starts to interfere with the life you want to live and this happens when your fear of rejection becomes intertwined with your view of yourself when you believe you will be rejected because you believe you have some inherent flaw, deficiency or lack of character, you were cheated on after that first date and you believe it is because you are not lovable or attractive enough, you got rejected at the job your dreams and you think it's because you're not smart or competent enough, you're out of that group of friends and you think it's because you're not interesting or fun enough, our fear of rejection is actually a fear of being less than you are. we want to be. less than we think we should be or less than we think society wants us to be, and over time this belief system can develop into a social anxiety disorder.

When a person has social anxiety disorder, they worry too much about other people scrutinizing them and evaluating them harshly, ultimately rejecting them so much that they begin to build their lives around avoiding rejection because if you can avoid other people notice you, then those people have fewer data points on which to reject you now. Social anxiety disorder is one of the most common mental illnesses in the

world

, many estimates place it second only to depression, in the United States alone, more than 12 percent of Americans at some point in their lives. lives will have a diagnosable social anxiety disorder, which currently affects approximately 40 million people

world

wide.

The estimates are lower at four percent, which in itself is interesting, but based on current population estimates, four percent of the world's approximately 300 million people will potentially have a social anxiety disorder at some point. time of your life and, despite its prevalence, it is widely misunderstood, misdiagnosed, and often overlooked entirely. This is because several myths about social anxiety permeate our culture. The first myth is that people with social anxiety are happier alone. A stereotype of someone with social anxiety is a recluse who would rather hide alone in her room than interact with the world. This is simply not true.

In research conducted in my laboratory we found that people with social anxiety disorder desire strong, healthy intimate relationships to the same degree as those without mental illness and they socialize, they are not robotic aliens and when they socialize they often enjoy themselves. In fact, when we ask people with social anxiety how happy they are, they say they feel happier when they are with other people than when they are alone. This is because not all social interactions are stressful. Maybe someone feels socially anxious around friends, but not around others. romantic partner or feel anxious around strangers and acquaintances, but not with people like their neighbors or coworkers, so although some interactions are stressful, people with social anxiety are not exempt from the basic desire for human connection, they just have problems obtaining it in certain situations. with certain people it's okay, so maybe then people with social anxiety socialize and when they do they enjoy it, but it's with a small, close-knit group of people and really social anxiety is about avoiding the spotlight and this is the second myth which is social anxiety. not necessarily because of fear of performing in public, well this is true for some people, other people with social anxiety find that performing in front of others causes them less anxiety than smaller, more intimate conversations, such as when they have to carry on a conversation one on one. one with many people with social anxiety excels in careers that are intertwined with social evaluation and social performance as a sports performance model in may 2021 naomi osaka refused to participate in the french open press conferences, bravely shared and preemptively which exacerbated her social anxiety shortly after she received a wave of public reaction and scrutiny, she goes on to play her first match, of course wins and then withdraws from the French open, many people were perplexed about how someone could have anxiety social and also being the number one tennis player in the world leading a fashion. she campaigned with Nike, a good choice and on the sports cover illustrated in a swimsuit in an interview the previous year in which she talked about her social anxiety.

Osaka explained that on the court she is completely different. I love playing at Arthur Ashe because it's the biggest stadium and you can feel the roar. From the audience you feel like a gladiator because it's a super big event and there are a lot of people watching your game, but off the field, if I ever saw myself in a situation where I had to speak in front of 100 people, I would feel like would start to shake, there is no single profile of social anxiety, just like people who are depressed have different sets of symptoms at different times and for different reasons, social anxiety looks different in different people and the last and perhaps most problematic myth is that social anxiety is fleeting and harmless social anxiety is not something you overcome over time, it does not magically disappear when you graduate from middle or high school without intervention, many people struggle with social anxiety for years, during decades, and social anxiety can influence all aspects of a person's life it can influence the hobbies they choose - perhaps opting for solo activities, such as reading and writing, instead of things like team sports, it can influence In the careers that people pursue, maybe opt for more individual careers, like computer time instead of things like sales or customer service and social media. anxiety can influence people's daily lives ricky williams nfl star running back heisman winning running back dazzled millions of people on the football field every week and yet he shared that he struggled with social anxiety and because of it he had difficulties interacting with teammates who were running everyday errands where she would have to interact with people and even interact with her own daughter.

The true tragedy of social anxiety is that it robs individuals of their greatest resource. Others. Other people help us overcome adversity, such as recovering from an illness or after failing a job interview. people help us celebrate milestones like attending the birth of our child or a wedding or graduation and other people help us overcome losses like grieving the death of a loved one our fear of rejection gets in the way of obtaining and appreciate the benefits of being accepted the benefits of other people and in our

modern

world it is more difficult than ever to manage social anxiety.

We are more connected today than at any other time in human history, and yet we are lonelier, more depressed, and more socially anxious than ever. We have infinite tools to do it. We socialize and yet we are seeing a decline in social connection in a rapid period of time. Our social structures have been altered and rewritten. Technology and social media have created new standards for social relationships and interactions. The public? I share it? I like it? I love it? We create these strange extensions of ourselves through curated profiles and now avatars. We try to make sense of the unlimited feedback from a massive and often invisible audience.

The cost of social errors is greater. The things you do and the things you say can live online. forever and will subject you to relentless scrutiny, loss of reputation and even loss of employment, it's a difficult time to have social anxiety, but the world will be more connected, not less, and the influence of technology and social media will grow, will not diminish, now is the time to address social media. anxiety and this is how the first and perhaps easiest thing we can do is identify early detection is essential because those who develop a social anxiety disorder, more than half will have developed it before turning 14 years old, more than half and Social anxiety puts people at risk for developing other mental illnesses later In adults who are diagnosed with social anxiety disorder and a mood disorder such as depression, social anxiety appeared first in 70% of In adults who were diagnosed with both a social anxiety disorder and an alcohol use disorder, social anxiety appeared first, developed first about 80 percent of the time, what this data suggests is that social anxiety It starts early and puts people at risk of developing other mental illnesses, but here's the amazing part that social anxiety can be reliably and accurately detected by just asking a few people.

Simple questions like: Is your fear of rejection one of your worst fears? Does your fear of rejection get in the way of doing things you would otherwise like to do or enjoy? The cost of asking these questions is like 30 seconds and zero dollars we don't have to create new infrastructure we don't have to alter existing ones we can incorporate early detection programs into our existing structures, like in schools, one-on-one new year guidance counselor meetings and in primary care settings because if a clinician can detect depression then they can also detect social anxiety, early detection and then appropriate intervention can significantly alter the trajectories of young people.

The second thing we can do is take advantage of our platforms, one of the benefits of living in this hyperconnected world. world is that a single person can have a lot of power, can use his platforms to create significant and lasting social change. I mentioned Ricky Williams and Osaka, who have used their platforms to share about their social anxiety and from these two people alone we have seen the ripple effect in response to Osaka's announcement viola davis the emmy award winning actress tony shared that she struggles with anxiety social a woman whose job as an actress is to embody and express the complexities of people in very vulnerable and very public ways, but Frankly, these celebrities are not the poster child for social anxiety, they are just three of the millions who suffer and who are the brave enough to talk about it and we can do the same with our platforms, no matter how big or small, in our schools, in our workplaces, in our communities. and in our homes because regular, honest, open conversations about mental illness ultimately reduce thestigma, correct harmful myths, and give people the help they need.

The last thing we can do is encourage social courage. Addressing social anxiety is not about preventing or avoiding rejection. Address social situations. Anxiety is about fostering social courage. Being socially brave means seeking experiences and knowing that your chances of rejection are not zero; In fact, the chances of you being rejected at some point in your life at some point this year are high and, even worse, you could be rejected as such. a function of who you are things about yourself that you can't change where you come from how you look or who you love being socially brave means seeking experiences because they are important to you and knowing that the success of those pursuits does not depend on your worth as a human being.

Socially brave means knowing your worth and finding people and social groups that love and accept that person and being socially brave means inviting that person to apply for that job, speak at that meeting or that party or give that big talk. on that big stage knowing that rejection lurks around the corner, but the opportunity to grow and have a purpose shines brighter, a purpose not defined by ensuring that you go unnoticed in this world, but a purpose that makes you feel more alive, more present and more authentically grateful. you