Cognitive processes in social anxiety: the effects of self-focus, rumination and anticipatory processing

“Indeed, Nolen-Hoeksema conceptualized rumination as a trans-diagnostic factor [16], which, although being mainly associated with depression [17,18], represents a risk factor for multiple forms of psychopathology including anxiety in adults and young people [19,20].”

“Taken together, the results of Brown and Stopa (2006) and Mellings and Alden (2000) seem somewhat inconsistent with other studies.”

“Despite this evidence that most individuals with SAD have adequate social skills, numerous studies have confirmed the association between increased levels of social anxiety and poorer self-ratings of performance (Abbott & Rapee, 2004; Dannahy & Stopa, 2007; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Rapee & Lim, 1992).”

“Overall, there is a growing consensus that high- and low-TA participants differ in the organization of their emotional memory and the degree of elaboration given to worry and nonworry themes (Mellings & Alden, 2000; Reidy, 2004).”

“cues. For example, Mellings and Alden (2000) have shown that socially anxious individuals”

“Decreased self-focus reduces anxious distress, ruminative preoccupation, and defensive avoidance of self-threatening information (Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“A recent study showed that gaze avoidance does not necessarily relate to the general avoidance of another person’s emotions (Mellings & Alden, 2000), but that highly socially anxious individuals gain an insight into other people’s emotions by attending to alternative information sources, for…”

“…and research has confirmed that self-focused attention is associated with poorer recall of information from the social environment and heightened recall of self-referential information (Daly et al., 1989; D’Argembeau et al., 2006; Hope et al., 1990; Mansell et al., 2003; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“Given that many approaches suggest that rumination is a manifestation of experiential avoidance (Mellings & Alden, 2000), these strategies may also serve to avoid contact with the failure.”

“While in clinical health psychology, rumination encompasses repetitive thinking about emotional aspects of individual problems and failure, which inhibit individuals’ ability to engage in problemsolving and is related to depression (Lyubomirsky et al., 1998; Mellings and Alden, 2000; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 2008; Zawad…”

“Consistent with past research (e.g. Abbott & Rapee, 2004; Kocovski & Rector, 2008; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Rachman et al., 2000), it was hypothesized that levels of social anxiety would be positively associated with levels of post-event processing.”

“Several studies have also shown a predictive role of rumination in social anxiety among adults (Brozovich et al., 2015; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Wong & Moulds, 2012) and adolescents (Orue et al., 2014; Zhang & Zhou, 2018) when faced with social events.”

“The differential aspects of the model have been confirmed in several experimental studies (e.g. Amir, Weber, Beard, Bomyea and Taylor, 2008; Clark, 2001; Stopa and Clark, 2000; Mellings and Alden, 2000; Spurr and Stopa, 2002; Woody, 1996).”

“…generalized anxiety (Fresco, Frankel, Mennin, Turk, & Heimberg, 2002; McEvoy, Watson, Watkins, & Nathan, 2013), posttraumatic stress (Ehring, Frank, & Ehlers, 2008; Mayou, Ehlers, & Bryant, 2002), and social anxiety (Brozovich & Heimberg, 2008; Chen, Rapee, & Abbott, 2013; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“Negative attributes about oneself and negative social outcomes can be inferred from the experience of anxious symptoms, a cognitive bias called " emotional reasoning " (e.g., Hackman, Surawy, & Clark, 1998; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“Indeed, social anxiety-related symptoms, thoughts and feelings, including state and trait anxiety, are significant predictors of PER (Kiko et al., 2012; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“26,27 This selectively, and internal focused attention, may distract from technically induced dissonance, leaving this population particularly receptive for VRET.”

“Research suggests that individuals with social anxiety tend to ruminate more frequently (Mellings & Alden, 2000; Rachman, Grṻter-Andrew, & Shafran, 2000), potentially perpetuating social anxiety and promoting feelings of shame.”

“Indeed, studies have shown that elevated SFA is associated with poorer recall of external cues and details from social interactions (Daly et al., 1989; Hope, Heimberg, & Klein, 1990; Kimble & Zehr, 1982; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“…of SA also suggests that people with elevated SA tend to think, behave, and regulate their emotions in maladaptive ways across a range of social contexts (e.g., Clark and Wells, 1995; Kashdan et al., 2013; 2014; Kim, 2005; Mellings and Alden, 2000; Pineles and Mineka, 2005; Wells et al., 1995).”

“Following prior studies (Hope, Heimberg, & Klein, 1990; Mellings & Alden, 2000), participants engaged in an impromptu conversation task with a research assistant, which provided an interpersonal context to assess self-evaluation bias.”

“Studies have shown that high socially anxious individuals engage in more prolonged post-event processing than low socially anxious individuals, which involves processing of memories that are recurrent, intrusive, and interfering with concentration [12,15,16].”

“Socially anxious individuals often exhibit a bias towards recalling negative self-related information (Edwards, Rapee, & Franklin, 2003), which is predicted by negative PEP (Mellings & Alden, 2000; Rapee & Abbott, 2007).”

“This mechanism has been suggested previously in studies of social anxiety (Mellings and Alden 2000; Edwards et al. 2003).”

“…found rumination to be characterized by repetitive thinking about personal problems and failure, to inhibit individuals’ ability to engage in problem-solving and to be linked to depression (Lyubomirsky et al., 1998; Mellings and Alden, 2000; NolenHoeksema et al., 2008; Zawadzki et al., 2013).”

“…(e.g., Rumination on Sadness Scale – Conway, Csank, Holm, & Blake, 2000; Stress-Reactive Rumination Scale – Alloy et al., 2000; Rumination Questionnaire – Mellings & Alden, 2000), of which Ruminative Responses Scale (RRS; NolenHoeksema & Morrow, 1991) is one of the most widely used (e.g., Dinis,…”

“Anticipatory processing also has been shown to be associated with post event processing, a ruminative component of social phobia (Mellings & Alden, 2000), which is also associated with poorer treatment response (Price & Anderson, 2011).”

“As for social anxiety, individuals with high social anxiety tend to engage in rumination by reviewing and negatively evaluating their social performance (McLaughlin & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2011; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“[9,10] Rumination as cognitive style,[11] has been associated with depression[12] generalized anxiety[13] and social anxiety.[10]”

“The role of rumination after adverse experiences in the past in SAD becoming chronic has been proven by various studies (Abbott & Rapee, 2003; Wells et al., 1995; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“On one hand, people with social anxiety focus on and exaggerate the uncompli-mentary aspects of their self-image (Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“…reported by high socially anxious individuals (Dannahy & Stopa, 2007; Edwards, Rapee, & Franklin, 2003; Kashdan & Roberts, 2007; Kocovski, Endler, Rector, & Flett, 2005; Mellings & Alden, 2000), and by clients with SAD (Abbott & Rapee, 2004; Perini, Abbott, & Rapee, 2006; Rapee & Abbott, 2007).”

“…social behavior could be evaluated negatively by peers (Vassilopoulos & Banerjee, 2008), status-preserving goals may promote attentional bias toward “negative self-related social information” (Mellings & Alden, 2000, p. 254), setting them on a developmental pathway towards social anxiety disorder.”

“…psychological problem such as depression (Lyubomirsky, Caldwall, & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998; Thomsen, Mehlsen, Christensen & Zachariae, 2003), anxiety (Mellings & Alden, 2000), anger (Hogan & Linden, 2004), poor sleep quality (Thomsen et al., 2003), and somatic symptoms (Brosschot & Van Der Doef,…”

“Individuals with social anxiety and SAD have been shown to display negatively biased self-ratings (e.g., Alden & Wallace, 1995; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Rapee & Lim, 1992; Wallace & Alden, 1997).”

“…research suggests that stress-reactive rumination is a predictor of later depression (Robinson & Alloy, 2003) and later ruminative thinking has been linked to more stressful interpersonal interactions (e.g., Abbot & Rapee, 2004; Harvey et al., 2005; Lundh & Sperling, 2002; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“Anxiety may lead to conscious and unconscious regressive acts, which distort the perception of reality and lead to dysfunctional behaviour and defensive routines ( Mellings and Alden, 2000”

“…or elevated social anxiety engage in more PEP than do control groups and the tendency to do so is predicted by the severity of social anxiety (e.g., Mellings & Alden, 2000; Edwards, Rapee, & Franklin, 2003; Kiko et al., 2012; Kocovski, MacKenzie, & Rector, 2011), state anxiety (e.g., Kocovski &…”

“AI: Assertion Inventory [58]; CMT: Compassionate Mind Training [59]); HMD: Head-Mounted Display; MSCS: Mindfulness Self-Care Scale [43]; PERS: Post-Event Rumination Scale [60–62]; RAS: Rathus Assertiveness Schedule [63]; RQ: Rumination Questionnaire [64]; SCIA: Social Contexts Inducing Anxieties [65]; SCCS: Self-compa…”

“A modified version of the FAQ as described in Mellings and Alden (2000) was used to assess SFA during the social situation.”

“Anticipatory anxiety occurs before a social situation and involves recall of the collection of negative memories and predictions, which begins the anxiety process (Mellings and Alden, 2000).”

“…Rapee, & Franklin, 2003; Perini © 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group CONTACT Sylvia Helbig-Lang sylvia.helbig-lang@uni-hamburg.de et al., 2006), thus, PEP might consolidate negative self-evaluations (Abbott & Rapee, 2004; Cody & Teachman, 2011; Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“doi:10.1016/S0005-7967(99)00040-6 Mitte, K. (2008). Memory bias for threatening information in anxiety and anxiety disorders: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 134, 886–911. doi: 10.1037/a0013343 Mogg, K., Mathews, A., & Weinman, J. (1987). Memory bias in clinical anxiety. Journal of Abnormal Psychology,…”

“…with a negative memory bias in patients with SP, and studies have documented an increase in negative memory recall in patients with depression and anxiety after engaging in rumination (Field & Morgan, 2004; Mellings & Alden, 2000; Moulds, Kandris, & Williams, 2007; Sutherland & Bryant, 2007).”

“…the actual anxiety-inducing event, and during post-event processing. possibility of negative evaluation or performing poorly in social situations may lead to anxiety that is experienced prior to (anticipatory), during, and following a social event (Donohue et al. 2024; Mellings and Alden 2000).”

“In an intervention study of rumination and social anxiety among undergraduate psychology students, Mellings [11] revealed that reducing students’ rumination was effective in reducing their focus on negative information about themselves, thereby lowering their levels of social anxiety.”

“Self ‐ focused attention during an interaction leads to biased judgments and recollections of the event, and this pattern is more pronounced among highly socially anxious than less socially anxious individuals (Melling & Alden, 2000).”

“Mellings and Alden (2000) used the Fear of Negative Evaluation scale (FNE; Watson & Friend, 1969) to distinguish116 undergraduates into high and low social anxiety groups.”

“There is some evidence in the attention literature to support this, with lowsocially anxious individuals being less sensitive to internal cues even after primes to shift their attention internally relative to highly socially anxious samples (Mellings & Alden, 2000; Papageorgiou & Wells, 2002).”

“Greater recall of negative self-related information has also been associated with post-event rumination in young adults (Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“In one of the first studies to examine anticipatory processing and how it contributes to biases in judgments and memory for social events, Mellings and Alden (2000) had 58 socially anxious undergraduates and 58 non-anxious controls participate in a social interaction and then complete measures of…”

“Consistent with these findings, studies have reported that socially anxious individuals engage in greater rumination and recall more negative information about oneself the day after a social event (Mellings and Alden 2000; Dannahy and Stopa 2007) and in the week following a speech task (Abbott and Rapee 2004; Penney a…”

“Like embarrassment, social anxiety leads to an inconsistency between the audience’s actual feelings and what the socially-anxious individual perceives the audience to be feeling (Mellings & Alden, 2000).”

“Additionally, experimental research by Mellings and Alden (2000) found that participants high in social anxiety reported engaging in more PEP about a social event occurring on the previous day than did participants low in social anxiety.”

“…with this alternative hypothesis regarding anxiety and memory, the few studies that have demonstrated enhanced memory for threat in social anxiety have used personally relevant stimuli (Breck and Smith 1983; Daly et al. 1989; Mellings and Alden 2000; O’Banion and Arkowitz 1977, Smith, et al. 1983).”

“…attentional bias towards signs of disapproval (e.g., Lundh & Öst, 1996), negative interpretation of ambiguous events (e.g., Stopa & Clark, 2000), increased self-focused attention (e.g., Mellings & Alden, 2000), and the generation of negative self-images (e.g., Hackmann, Clark, & McNanus, 2000).”