Heterosocial anxiety in college females. A biased interactions treatment.
Stack easy, positive peer chats to re-label socially anxious clients as competent.
01Research in Context
What this study did
College women who felt anxious around men joined a lab study.
They were paired with friendly male helpers for short chats.
Each woman was set up to succeed: the helper followed a script that kept the talk smooth and positive.
After several of these wins, the women rated their fear again.
What they found
The fake wins worked.
Self-ratings and real-time behavior both showed less anxiety.
The boost happened even when the women were told the setup was rigged.
How this fits with other research
Edgin et al. (2017) seems to say the opposite.
They found that teens with mild ID who are more socially anxious read neutral social cues in a negative way.
The difference is the group: the teens already expect failure, so their bias stays dark.
Our college women expected failure too, but the lab gave them bright data that overrode the old story.
Turkkan (1994) used a similar lab trick and showed that college students trust the feedback you give them.
Together the papers say: hand clients clear proof of success and their self-label can flip.
Why it matters
You can script victory moments for anxious learners.
Pick a short peer interaction, brief the partner on how to keep it upbeat, then let your client run the scene.
Three or four wins can cut the fear enough to try real-world chats.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
A behavioral exposure procedure based on Bem's (1972) self-perception theory using prearranged purposefully biased social interactions with members of the opposite sex was employed to treat heterosocial anxiety in college females. Additionally, subjects received either a positive or negative expectancy for treatment outcome. Results for 20 heterosocially anxious females indicated the biased interaction exposure technique was unaffected by expectancy and caused significant changes in subject's perceived levels of heterosocial anxiety. Improvement also occurred on a self-report (state anxiety) measure and two behavioral (interpersonal distance and conversational silence) measures taken while subjects were in the presence of a male confederate. These results suggested the biased exposure treatment-where the focus was on the observation of one's own successful performance in an area where difficulty is normally encountered-was effective for reducing anxiety in college females. Results are discussed in terms of the unique aspects of this procedure and the possible situations where it might be most useful.
Behavior modification, 1983 · doi:10.1177/01454455830074009