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The Role of Traumatic Experiences and Posttraumatic Stress on Social Anxiety in a Youth Sample in Lithuania

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Abstract

Emerging adulthood is a developmental stage with an increased vulnerability to mental disorders. Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is highly prevalent anxiety disorder especially among adolescents and young adults. Furthermore, SAD is highly comorbid with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of SAD, life-time traumatic experiences and PTSD among Lithuanian young adults studying at the Universities. We also aimed to search for associations between social anxiety, traumatic experiences, and posttraumatic stress in our sample. In total 590 young adults (67.7% female), aged 20 years on average and studying at the Universities in Lithuania were recruited for this study. Self-report measures were used to measure SAD and PTSD. SAD was measured using the Social Phobia Inventory (SPIN), and PTSD was measured using the Impact of Event Scale – Revised (IES-R). SAD prevalence based on SPIN cut-off >26 in our sample was 15.3%, life-time trauma exposure was 67.5%. No association between accumulative trauma exposure and SAD was found. SAD symptoms were highly correlated with PTSD symptoms. Comorbidity between SAD and PTSD was high, with 32.2% cases of PTSD in SAD group. We found high comorbidity between SAD and PTSD in our study among young adults. Further studies are needed to explore development of SAD and PTSD in longitudinal studies.

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Funding

This project has received funding from European Social Fund (project No 09.3.3-LMT-K-712-02-0096) under grant agreement with the Research Council of Lithuania (LMTLT).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Psychotraumatology, Institute of Psychology, Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania. Universiteto str. 9, 01513, Vilnius, Lithuania

    Monika Kvedaraite, Paulina Zelviene & Evaldas Kazlauskas

  2. National Center for Psychotraumatology, Institute of Psychology, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark

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Authors
  1. Monika Kvedaraite
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  2. Paulina Zelviene
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  3. Ask Elklit
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  4. Evaldas Kazlauskas
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Correspondence to Evaldas Kazlauskas.

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Authors declare they have no conflict of interest.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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The authors declare that they have no competing interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

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Kvedaraite, M., Zelviene, P., Elklit, A. et al. The Role of Traumatic Experiences and Posttraumatic Stress on Social Anxiety in a Youth Sample in Lithuania. Psychiatr Q 91, 103–112 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11126-019-09684-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11126-019-09684-7

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