title: Developmental pathways of social avoidance across adolescence: the role of social anxiety and negative cognition.
abstract: It is argued that the adolescent onset of social anxiety disorder (SAD) may be partly attributable to an increase in avoidance of social situations across this period. The current cohort-sequential study investigated developmental pathways of social avoidance in adolescence and examined the explanatory role of social anxiety and negative cognitive processes. A community sample of youth (9-21 years, N=331) participated in a four-wave study. Trajectory analyses revealed two pathways: an increased avoidance pathway and a low avoidance pathway. The pathways were hardly distinguishable at age 9 and they steadily diverged across adolescence. Logistic regression analyses showed that social anxiety and post-event rumination were significantly related to the increased avoidance pathway; anticipatory processing and self-focused attention were not. The findings suggest that adolescence is a key developmental period for the progression of social avoidance among youth who show relatively high levels of social anxiety and post-event rumination.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Institute of Psychology, Unit Developmental and Educational Psychology, Pieter de la Court Building, P.O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Electronic address: acmiers@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.
authors.forename: Anne C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Miers
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Institute of Psychology, Unit Developmental and Educational Psychology, Pieter de la Court Building, P.O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Electronic address: bloete@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.
authors.forename: Anke W
authors.initials: AW
authors.lastname: Blöte
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Institute of Psychology, Unit Developmental and Educational Psychology, Pieter de la Court Building, P.O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Electronic address: heyne@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Heyne
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Institute of Psychology, Unit Developmental and Educational Psychology, Pieter de la Court Building, P.O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Electronic address: Westenberg@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.
authors.forename: P Michiel
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Westenberg
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D000367:Age Factors; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology*; D002648:Child; D003071:Cognition; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000523:psychology; D012934:Social Isolation / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Adolescence; Avoidance; Life interference; Post-event rumination; Social anxiety