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Karlee Thomas

Bell

English 1201.516

March 21, 2021

Literary review

Social anxiety is a chronic mental health condition in which social interactions cause

irrational anxiety. Social anxiety is classified as a phobia that interferes with everyday

interactions. Many people struggle with social anxiety including myself; what causes social

anxiety to form and what causes it to escalate to total isolation?

40 million people in the US struggle with some form of anxiety, of that 15,000,000

million of them struggle with social anxiety and that only counts the diagnosed cases. Social

anxiety is a huge problem, it leads to some people avoiding all social interactions going into

complete isolation. Its important to understand social anxiety mannerisms and how to healthily

cope with them (Medical News Today).

An example of social anxiety being exhibited in film is “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”

(2014). The movie directed by and starring Ben Stiller is about a man who works for life

magazine, who is looking for Sean O’Connell his coworker who searches for their exotic

subjects as well as a missing photo that will help him keep his job at the magazine that is firing

people to go digital. The movie exemplifies Walter’s social anxiety through the scenes that the

movie is split showing the fantasies made up in Walter’s head when he’s experiencing social
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anxiety while talking to coworkers or his boss, which causes him to be completely out of touch

with the reality of a situation (Spirituality Practice)

Due to many being uneducated on the topic some go untreated with social anxiety. The

disorder left untreated can result in lower-quality relationships, low self-esteem, lower

socioeconomic status, financial issues. Usually unless you’ve been diagnosed for any other

mental disorder, considering some mental disorders stem from others, you’re either unaware or

less likely to get tested (NCBI).

Between 2011 and 2013 the number of teens with smartphones increased by 14 percent,

and in 2012 around eighty-one percent of teens used some form of social media. Because of this

lots of people think that the odds of someone forming social anxiety is because of the increase of

social media use. A study done by Isaac Yaghefi found the average person will unlock their cell

phone more than 200 time per day he says it’s because, “its easier to look a screen then look

someone in the eye” (the Atlantic).

A more extreme treatment for social anxiety is hypnotherapy. A study done by University

of Northampton had a client who had already been attending cognitive-behavior therapy, who

was switched to hypnotherapy, used to modify negative self-suggestions and irrational automatic

thoughts. After only two sessions the patient showed significant results and by the 6th session the

level of anxiety had decreased, and the mood state was brought up (Contemporary Hypnosis &

Integrative Therapy).

Some misconceptions about social anxiety are some people think it’s just avoiding large

crowds or just not liking people all that much, but for example it could be, not getting up to do

something on your own because you’re afraid of somehow doing it wrong and feeling judged by
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other for it, or not going to a social event because you wont know anyone or the people you do

know aren’t people who understand you anxiety. The places I need to further my research is

what determines whether its social anxiety or nervousness, is gender a factor, and what causes

social anxiety to form.

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Work cited

cohut. “Coping with Social Anxiety: The Dos and the Don’ts.” Www.medicalnewstoday.com, 30

Aug. 2019, www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/326211. Accessed 7 Mar. 2021.

conrad. “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.” Microsoft, 2013, www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/the-

secret-life-of-walter-mitty/8d6kgwzj5s0q. Accessed 7 Mar. 2021.

Ossola, Alexandra. “The Atlantic.” The Atlantic, The Atlantic, 14 Jan. 2015,

www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/01/the-socially-anxious-

generation/384458/. Accessed 14 Dec. 2019.

Rose, Gregory M., and Prasanna Tadi. “Social Anxiety Disorder.” PubMed, StatPearls

Publishing, 2020, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK555890/. Accessed 7 Mar. 2021.

VOLKOVYSKAYA, EVGENIA. “The Use of Clinical Hypnotherapy in the Treatment of Social

Anxiety and Panic Attacks: A Case Study.” Contemporary Hypnosis & Integrative Therapy, vol.

34, no. 1, Mar. 2020, pp. 44–53. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?

direct=true&db=ccm&AN=142962420&site=eds-live.