Shyness
Shyness
Shyness can be defined by the presence of anxious reactions, excessive self-consciousness, and negative self-evaluation in response to real or imagined social interactions to the degree that it produces enough discomfort to interfere with and inhibit one’s ability to perform successfully in social situations and also to the extent that it disrupts one’s personal and professional goals. The symptoms of shyness can be affective (e.g., heightened feelings of tension and anxiety), physiological (e.g., racing heart, dryness of the mouth), cognitive (e.g., heightened self-consciousness and excessive thoughts of critical self-evaluation), and behavioral (e.g., increased interpersonal distance, inhibited verbal participation, and lack of eye contact). The number of adults who consider themselves to be chronically shy (e.g., shy their entire lives) is approximately 40 percent (Carducci 1999).
Subtypes of shyness include situational shyness (temporary shyness triggered by specific situations such as meeting a famous person), shy extroversion (outgoing appearance coexisting with a high degree of anxiety and negative self-evaluation, often experienced by entertainers), and transitional shyness (an extended period of shyness brought on by life changes such as moving to a new town). Introversion is not considered a subtype of shyness. Although shyness and introversion are similar in their overt expressions of behavior, they differ in their underlying motives. Introverts do not necessarily fear social situations, but simply prefer more solitary activities. Shy individuals, like extroverts, prefer social activities but are restrained in their participation by the experience of shyness. This approach-avoidance conflict is a source of distress for shy individuals.
The characteristic features of shyness include an excessive degree of self-consciousness, negative self-evaluation, and negative self-preoccupation. Shy individuals also demonstrate a slow-to-warm tendency characterized by an extended period of adjustment to social situations, especially those that are novel. Situational shyness is the transitory experience of shyness that can be triggered by a variety of situations, the most frequent being interactions with authorities, one-to-one interactions with members of the opposite sex, and unstructured social settings.
The most frequently used measure of shyness is the Revised Shyness Scale (RSS). The RSS contains fourteen items assessing the three principal dimensions of shyness: affective/physiological (e.g., “I feel tense with people I don’t know”), cognitive (e.g., “I feel painfully self-conscious when I am around strangers”), and behavioral (e.g., “it is hard for me to act natural when I am meeting new people”). The RSS uses a five-point Likert scale, with responses ranging from 1 (“very uncharacteristic or untrue, strongly disagree”) to 5 (“very characteristic or true, strongly agree”). Scores on the RSS demonstrate acceptable test-retest reliability and validity by correlating highly with other measures of shyness, social avoidance, and interpersonal difficulty.
Distinctions have been made between shyness and other socially related constructs. Like shyness, embarrassment is characterized by heightened self-consciousness, but unlike shyness, embarrassment includes feelings of guilt and is a response that occurs after an inappropriate social response in the presence of others. Individuals do not experience embarrassment prior to the performance of an inappropriate response or when others are not present. In contrast, the affective (e.g., anticipatory feelings of anxiety), cognitive (e.g., assuming one’s comments will be judged unfavorably by others), and behavioral (e.g., not approaching others) responses characteristic of shyness can occur prior to the actual performance and in the absence of others (e.g., before entering a social situation). Social anxiety, like shyness, involves anxiety and self-critical evaluation in novel social settings, but to a greater degree: Individuals affected by social anxiety have greater difficulties in social situations (e.g., parties) and therefore may avoid them, but there is little disruption in other social aspects of their public lives (e.g., riding on public transportation, eating in a restaurant, or going shopping). Social phobia, which is experienced by approximately 8 percent of the population, is a clinically diagnosed psychiatric condition that, like shyness and social anxiety, involves feelings of anxiety and excessive critical self-evaluation, but to such a greater degree that it has a much more pervasive and disruptive influence on one’s ability to participate in everyday situations.
Causes of shyness can be psychological (e.g., the result of family dynamics), biological (e.g., determined by hormonal and neurotransmitter levels), genetic (e.g., inherited temperament), neurological (e.g., bed nucleus of the striate terminals), or cultural (e.g., prioritizing the individual over the collective). The evolutionary benefits of shyness include cautionary behavior in novel and potentially threatening situations and the facilitation of social exchange and cooperation through the reduced tendency for self-serving expression. The personal costs of shyness include increased personal blame for interpersonal failures, loneliness, and substance abuse; the social costs, particularly for males, include less stable marriages, career delay, and lower levels of career advancement.
Interventions available for dealing with shyness include informational Web sites, self-help books, self-directed programs, online and offline social support groups, and structured clinical programs. Different treatment approaches are utilized depending on which component of shyness is targeted. Approaches for dealing with the affective component of shyness tend to focus on the reduction of bodily arousal, such as progressive relaxation techniques and biofeedback. Approaches for dealing with the cognitive component of shyness typically emphasize cognitive modification, such as revising self-perceptions, altering attributions, and adjusting expectations for defining success in social situations. Approaches for dealing with the behavior component of shyness emphasize the acquisition and development of social skills, such as strategies for approaching others, techniques for initiating and maintaining conversation, and procedures for entering ongoing conversations. Structured clinical programs typically involve combining elements from all the approaches, such as cognitive modification to identify which situations produce the most critical self-evaluations and structured role-playing exercises within the context of systematic desensitization to reduce anxiety, teach appropriate behavioral responses, and build self-confidence. An emerging, controversial view of shyness links it to more serious psychiatric conditions such as social phobia and emphasizes its treatment with prescription drugs, such as those based on selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs).
SEE ALSO Anxiety; Neuroscience; Personality; Psychotherapy; Temperament; Trait Theory
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Carducci, Bernardo J. 1999. Shyness: A Bold New Approach. New York: HarperCollins.
Crozier, W. Ray. 2001. Understanding Shyness. Basingstoke, U.K.: Palgrave.
Hernderson, Lynne, and Philip G. Zimbardo. 2001. Shyness as a Clinical Condition: The Stanford Model. In International Handbook of Social Anxiety: Concepts, Research, and Interventions Relating to the Self and Shyness, eds. W. Ray Crozier and Lynn E. Alden, 431-447. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
Schmidt, Louis A., and Jay Schulkin, eds. 1999. Extreme Fear, Shyness, and Social Phobia: Origins, Biological Mechanisms, and Clinical Outcomes. New York: Oxford University Press.
Bernardo J. Carducci