title: How awkward! Social anxiety and the perceived consequences of social blunders.
abstract: Seventy high socially anxious (HSA) and 74 low socially anxious (LSA) participants rated perceived interpersonal and emotional consequences of both (a) autobiographical social blunders recalled from their own lives and (b) imagined blunders presented in standardized hypothetical social scenarios. Ratings of participants' autobiographical blunders were also provided by research assistants who were blind to hypotheses. Results indicated that HSA participants overestimated the negative consequences of their own autobiographical blunders. These negative perceptions among HSA participants extended to imagined blunders, even when participants were instructed to imagine a third party other than themselves as the person committing the blunder. This pattern of results suggests the conclusion that the perceived consequences of social blunders among HSA individuals are driven by the belief that social standards are high, inflexible, or both.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. West, Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3G1, Canada. dmosco@uwaterloo.ca
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Moscovitch
authors.forename: Thomas L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Rodebaugh
authors.forename: Benjamin D
authors.initials: BD
authors.lastname: Hesch
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology; D003863:Depression / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D011939:Mental Recall; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D012919:Social Behavior; D012938:Social Perception