title: Images of the self and self-esteem: do positive self-images improve self-esteem in social anxiety?
abstract: Negative self-images play an important role in maintaining social anxiety disorder. We propose that these images represent the working self in a Self-Memory System that regulates retrieval of self-relevant information in particular situations. Self-esteem, one aspect of the working self, comprises explicit (conscious) and implicit (automatic) components. Implicit self-esteem reflects an automatic evaluative bias towards the self that is normally positive, but is reduced in socially anxious individuals. Forty-four high and 44 low socially anxious participants generated either a positive or a negative self-image and then completed measures of implicit and explicit self-esteem. Participants who held a negative self-image in mind reported lower implicit and explicit positive self-esteem, and higher explicit negative self-esteem than participants holding a positive image in mind, irrespective of social anxiety group. We then tested whether positive self-images protected high and low socially anxious individuals equally well against the threat to explicit self-esteem posed by social exclusion in a virtual ball toss game (Cyberball). We failed to find a predicted interaction between social anxiety and image condition. Instead, all participants holding positive self-images reported higher levels of explicit self-esteem after Cyberball than those holding negative self-images. Deliberate retrieval of positive self-images appears to facilitate access to a healthy positive implicit bias, as well as improving explicit self-esteem, whereas deliberate retrieval of negative self-images does the opposite. This is consistent with the idea that negative self-images may have a causal, as well as a maintaining, role in social anxiety disorder.
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
authors.forename: Natalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Hulme
authors.forename: Colette
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hirsch
authors.forename: Lusia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Stopa
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D001143:Arousal; D001288:Attention; D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination; D007389:Internal-External Control; D007600:Judgment; D008297:Male; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology*; D011594:Psychometrics; D012649:Self Concept; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology; D055815:Young Adult