Decentering in Mindfulness and Cognitive Restructuring for Social Anxiety: An Experimental Study of a Potential Common Mechanism.
A single prompt that creates decentering makes socially anxious clients less afraid to speak up.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers randomly assigned socially anxious adults to three groups. One group got short mindfulness instructions. Another got cognitive restructuring instructions. The last group got neutral instructions.
After the brief training, each person gave a tough speech on camera. The team measured how much distance the speakers felt from their anxious thoughts.
What they found
Both mindfulness and cognitive restructuring beat the control at creating "decentering" — the sense that thoughts are just thoughts, not facts.
When people felt more decentering, they also felt less anxious and were more willing to approach scary speaking tasks.
How this fits with other research
Larsson et al. (2016) pitted cognitive restructuring against cognitive defusion. Defusion cut thought believability more than restructuring. The new study shows restructuring still works if you target decentering, so the two papers together say: pick defusion for fast believability drops, or either tool if you teach decentering.
Masuda et al. (2010) found you need the full defusion package — rationale, training, and a quick exercise — to beat simple distraction. Mulder et al. (2020) now show a single mindfulness or restructuring prompt can do the same job, updating the dose downward.
Koegel et al. (2014) ran a longer acceptance-based program for adults with both depression and social anxiety. Their open trial saw big symptom drops after sixteen sessions. The 2020 lab study hints one reason those gains happened: every acceptance or CR moment nudges decentering, which then lowers anxiety.
Why it matters
You can add a thirty-second decentering cue to any exposure session. Try "Notice the thought as just words" before a speech task, or teach clients to tag thoughts "I’m having the thought that..." during role play. No extra worksheets, no long protocol — just a quick pivot that boosts willingness and cuts anxiety on the spot.
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Join Free →Start the next exposure trial by saying, "See if you can watch the anxious thought like words on a screen," then run the speech task.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
The present study examined whether cognitive restructuring (CR) or mindfulness led to increases in decentering and whether changes in decentering were related to changes in anxiety and willingness to approach anxiety-provoking situations. Forty-six individuals with social anxiety completed speaking tasks before and after receiving CR, mindfulness, or control instructions. Overall, anxiety decreased and willingness increased from the first to second speech, with no differences across conditions. Decentering (measured by the Toronto Mindfulness Scale [TMS]) increased, with those in the mindfulness condition reporting more decentering. There was a nonsignificant, medium-sized effect on decentering, as measured by the Experiences Questionnaire (EQ)-Decentering factor, with those in CR reporting more decentering. Increases in decentering were associated with changes in self-reported anxiety and willingness. Findings indicate that mindfulness and CR led to changes in decentering, and that changes in decentering were related to changes in some, but not all, measures of anxiety.
Behavior modification, 2020 · doi:10.1177/0145445519850744