Social phobia is a psychological disorder that makes a person a social misfit. The affected person finds it difficult to fit in any social gathering or any activity that involves people. Depending on the environment they have been brought up in, such a person may only feel free around his or her close family members. Social phobia is a common occurrence in the society with millions of people in United States affected. However, the disorder is usually looked at as a personality, and therefore not giving it, the treatment attention required. A low self-esteem is just one of the symptoms exhibited by a person suffering from social phobia. Social phobia has no limitation when it comes to age and gender. The disorder is most commonly noticed in the early stages of adolescents and may proceed to later adulthood if the affected person is not treated on time.
Social phobia abnormally fearful of their surrounding and what may happen to them. The fear makes a person to shake when talking to people, whether physically or over the phone. In most cases, such people may even feel afraid of expressing themselves with the fear that they will be judged or mistaken. Social phobia makes person always suspect that somebody is watching them keenly and making wrong judgments about them. The feeling of fear hence makes them anxious especially when they have to attend to a social gathering. They exhibit the fear even when the occasion is in several weeks to come, the thought of them being around people causes them to be anxious. When it comes the time for them to face people, they shake, sweat and stammer. Social phobia is, however, treatable and the affected persons can be help to lead a normal life through therapy. If not treated it time, it leads to stress and subsequently depression, which can lead to dangerous consequences like death.
Symptoms
Symptoms of social phobia can be observed even in very young children and change as a person grows. Children with social phobia are usually withdrawn and prefer seating a lone without being disturbed. They tend to cry when talked to or asked questions especially in class, which could make them dread going to school. Children with social phobia also throw tantrums anyhow, especially when nobody seems to understand their feelings. Social phobia makes children afraid of meeting and even greeting strangers. The children will hence show a tendency of hiding away from guests when they come at home, and of they are forced to greet them, they will not give them an eye contact. The situation becomes even worse when the visitors demand more attention from them by asking questions. The children will lack the ability to answer them and instead cry or simply run away from them. Such a child may also be dormant in school and not show any interest in participating in class or co-curricular activities.
Symptoms exhibited in young children are usually ignored and considered as silly shyness but become more pronounced in teenage and adult years. Mature people usually dread any activity that involves many people and more especially strangers. The fear makes them come up with excuses of not attending certain events or occasions because they are not ready to face many people. Adults even fear eating and drinking in public places, even when they are genuinely hungry, they will not go to a restaurant or eat with other people. When with other people, adults with social phobia may not initiate a conversation or even participate in any. Social phobia also makes adults dreads standing before a group of people to address them or even go out for a nature call. Normal activities such as shopping, talking over the telephone and even working become quite taxing for social phobia victims.
Having a low self-esteem is also common among people with social phobia, as they cannot express themselves in public. Criticisms are just one of the fears that social phobia victims dread which makes them reserved in their activities. If they must talk to other people, social phobia adults will not give them an eye contact and instead stare at something else as they address them. Alcoholism and general drug and substance abuse become part of the life of social phobia victims as they turn to it as a remedy to minimize on the tension and phobia. Since the phobia makes them feel less of themselves, drugs and alcohol tends to give them the temporal courage that they need. Extremes of social phobia may also be accompanied by panic attacks, which can be seen physically. A person, whether teenage or adult make shake profoundly, cry, have lapses in their memory, feeling sick and even heart palpitations. The symptoms may last for only few minutes and never lead to physical harm or danger. Due to their social misfit condition, people suffering from social phobia may also have other mental problems such as stress and depression.
Causes
Most causes of social phobia stem from the childhood of the affected individuals. A child’s background plays an important role in shaping their behavior. Any compromise ,on how a child is treated at a tender age will reflect their behavior in the future. Most people exhibiting social phobia have had parents who were overly protective, demanding too much from them or discouraging from interacting with strangers. Some of the behaviors that guardians show towards their children may appear protective, yet turn out to be dangerous especially when the children pick the signals in a way they were not supposed to. For instance, it is common for parents to tell their children not to interact with strangers or take anything from them. Such a child will grow up with the assumption that strangers are bad. The children may not have the capacity to differentiate between which the good people are and those with evil intentions. The children will therefore avoid any person they have not grown up with due to the fear that they may harm them.
It is also common for parents to demand a lot from their children without realizing the danger they are causing to them and their future. Parents usually use threats and sometimes teachers with the aim of making them perform well in life. Even though the tactic works for some children who are motivated to perform better, to others, it becomes a source of fear and anxiety on what will happen to them if they do not meet their expectations. Some of the statements that are used by guardians to motivate their children may be abusive and hence affecting the psychological well being of the children. Most of such abuse may be verbal or even physical. Children who are unable to meet the expectations may be abused or even spanked, which makes them feel worthless. Frequent abuse makes children unable to concentrate and even socialize with other people, with the feeling that they cannot match their performance. The names they are called by their parents such ‘stupid’, ‘foolish’ etc affects the children who grow believing that nothing worth can come out of them.
Love and affection is an important ingredient to a child’s psychological development. Parents tend to be very busy, especially in modern society and therefore not attending to the children enough. Most children are usually left in the hands of caregivers who may not complement the love that their parents may give them. The children therefore grow up feeling lonely and unloved. Denying children the needed attention also makes them miss an important parental aspect of guidance. A parent who may have no time for their children especially during weekdays and sometimes weekends makes them ignorant of what their children are going through. Some of the children may actually be facing abuse in the hands of their caregivers and teachers yet lack a proper vessel to communicate their issues. Realizing that their parents are meant to be their best friends and not giving them such love, they assume that the world is full of friendless people. Such an attitude makes them live isolated lives, which is defined as social phobia.
The rising cases of crime, abduction, kidnap and the likes tend to make parents look for strategies to discourage children from interacting with strangers. Children usually demand answers as to why they are not supposed to interact with people they do not know. In an effort to drive the answer home, parents tell them all the negative things about strangers, which may cause fear within their children. For instance, a parent may tell a child that if they greet a person they do not know, they may be grabbed, abused or even killed. Children may interpret the statement to mean that any stranger that stretches a hand to greet them will grab and kill them. Such a behavior of avoiding people and not even greet them may extend to visitors who come home and any other harmless person that the children encounter, who is not familiar to them. Most parents may, however, be insensitive to the source of such behavior from their children and even scold at them for showing partiality to their guests.
Consequences
As harmless as social phobia may appear to be, especially in children, it can have dire consequences if not handled on time. Poor performance in class work is one of the negative consequences that school-going children will have to live with. The fear they develop towards life and people makes them unable to express themselves verbally and even physically. It is difficult to assist a person who is not willing to express himself or herself. This attitude makes it difficult for the children to seek assistance in their schoolwork from either their teachers or fellow students. Not being well equipped in their studies will translate to poor performance in school, which is likely to affect their future performance in careers or even family.
Alcoholism and substance abuse is also a common consequence for people with social disorder. The pressure that comes with life may not work well for social misfits in the society. Social phobia is, however a condition that a victim may not know how to handle and therefore seeking alternative measures to counter attack it. Drugs and alcohol becomes the best option for such people who gain temporal courage that enable them face their issues. Since social phobia is there to stay within them, substance abuse also becomes part of them. Most of the people with social phobia will appear in meetings and even school drunk or under the influence of drugs. Drug abuse is statuses they have to maintain to enable them face their condition and hence being able to face or even interact with other people. Once discovered, the consequences may even be dire, which include expulsion or suspension from school, demotion or sacking from their places of work.
Social phobia causes the victims to be anxious about almost everything, the anxiety causes them stress, which is likely to develop into depression. At the depression stage, victims of social phobia may totally withdraw from society as they feel nobody understands them. Eating disorders which may range from overeating, under eating and malnutrition are serious consequences accompanied by social phobia. Lack of appetite makes the victims shun away from food, which pose serious threats to their health. Some victims of social phobia may also indulge in overeating or binge eating, which are both dangerous to their health. Any form of eating disorder may lead to other serious health conditions such as obesity, skin infections, ulcers and the likes. These sicknesses may lead to other complications, which may cause death.
Prevention
Prevention has always been the best option to cure. Having understood what social phobia, how it is caused and the consequences, appropriate measures can be taken to prevent it. Parents and teachers are the key players when it comes to preventing children from developing social phobia. It is important for guardians to understand that anything they tell the children, or action displayed may negatively affect them. It is important for parents to realize the importance of being there for their children and understanding them before any other person can appreciate them. Children pick signals from their parents at a tender age, which become the basis on which the foundation of their life is established. Utmost caution should hence be taken when applying any form of action that is meant to be a disciplinary measure.
It is unfortunate that most of the symptoms of social phobia start showing when the child starts attending school. At the early stages of school, the situation is manageable as the child is still growing. The parents, with the help of teachers can help reverse the situation before it is complicated. It is usually recommended that at the initial stages of school, parents need to be in close contact with their children for the purpose of identifying any disorders and correcting them before they are complicated. Such precautions are hence what parents need to take their young children to ensure that they enjoy a fulfilling life. When a parent realizes that their behavior or treatment towards their children is negatively affecting them, they should be ready to change. It will be easier for them to prove to their children how unfair they have been and purpose to plant helpful virtues in them. Such prevention measures will be better than having to seek treatment at a sophisticated stage.
Treatment
Social phobia is a condition that can be treated at any stage of life. There are different ways through which the situation can be handled psychologically, depending on the age of the victim and the stage of the disorder. It is usually easier to treat children due to the minimum exposure they have had. However, to the mature individuals, the first psychological measure than needs to be taken is to ensure they recognize and admit the fact that they have a disorder. One of the limiting factors of curing psychological conditions is usually the inability to admit they have an issue that requires attention. However, once the victim has admitted such truth, it becomes easier to identify the most appropriate treatment for them.
Social phobia is a habitual condition whose best treatment is therapy. Therapy is usually admitted to reverse the condition by changing the attitude a person has towards life. Social phobia mostly affects the self-esteem of its victims, the therapy they are given is hence meant to bring back their worth through reassurance. In some instances, antidepressants are usually administered to the patients just to ensure they relax. Such medication is offered especially when the phobias is making the victims restless and have reached a stage where they are depressed. Rehabilitation may also be administered to victims who are addicted to alcohol and other drugs. Other treatment procedures include group therapies where the victims are trained on how to relate with other people. Since criticism is the biggest fear of social phobia victims, they are trained on how to effectively handle such critics during therapy so that they are not offended.
The rate at which any treatment procedure will work for the victim depends on how willing they are to change. Treatment for social phobia implies a total life change, which is mostly initiated by the victim. Irrespective of the efforts that may be employed by the psychiatrist to help the victim, they may all be in vain if the patient does not apply discipline to their life. Next to the patient of social disorder is his or her family members and close associates. Realizing that their acquaintance is struggling with a condition that they desire to overcome, family members and friends need to accord them with the necessary support. The support includes accommodating him or her in their group events, appreciate them for any contribution they make even if it appears silly and according them with a lot of love and affection.
Even after treatment, victims of social phobia may have a relapse of the same if they are not given the necessary support. It is hence necessary for follow up to be done once they are done with treatment to ensure they are completely healed. Care should be taken to ensure that the victims are not isolated or are exposed to conditions that led them to develop the condition. It is therefore important for the family members and friends of the victims to observe a total life change, just as the victim does. Such measures should be taken until when the individual has recorded a complete change. If necessary, a change of environment may be necessary like school and work place. Such a change will minimize on previous memories that may cause a relapse.
