Abstract
Anxiety disorder research may benefit from examining motivational factors, such as the difference between approach and avoidance goals. Self-regulation theories in particular suggest that affect serves as feedback for goal pursuit, with anxiety primarily providing feedback regarding avoidance. However, little information is available on participant goals for a specific task that generates social anxiety. In Study 1, we demonstrate that confidence regarding avoidance goals, importance ascribed to these goals, and the interaction between confidence and importance showed the most robust relationships with activated negative affect and positive affect ratings. In Study 2, we partially replicated the interactive effect but fully replicated the general finding of the importance of confidence in avoidance goals for both types of affect. Against hypothesis, ratings regarding avoidance goals were also more strongly related to positive affect. It appears likely that the various findings regarding cost and probability in the study of social anxiety disorder are related to these findings.
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Notes
We wish to acknowledge that an anonymous reviewer suggested this likely possibility in a review of a previous manuscript.
Data on topics selected is unavailable for 11 participants who took their topic sheet with them when they left; of the remainder, only four participants spoke on an unlisted topic. All other participants (n = 88) chose a student-specific topic.
It might be expected that the participants who did not report avoidance goals are simply those who have no difficulties with social anxiety. To test this possibility, number of avoidance goals was used to predict straightforward SIAS score in an ANOVA. Number of avoidance goals showed no tendency to predict the SIAS (P = .50).
We also examined whether any of the effects noted in either study were qualified by gender; none were, with the exception that in Study 2, the importance of approach goals was a significant predictor for men (part r = .40, P = .02), but not for women (part r = −.13, P = .44). Among men, higher approach goal importance was associated with more NA. This result was unexpected, and given that it was not found in Study 1, it requires replication prior to interpretation. Examination of ethnicity effects (in both studies) was precluded by the relatively small sample of non-white individuals, particularly for those participants who reported avoidance goals.
Partial mediation by social anxiety was still plausible. We used Preacher, Rucker, and Hayes’s method (2007) to assess whether the interaction between avoidance goal confidence and importance had an indirect relationship on anticipatory NA through trait social anxiety. In brief, two plausible models were supported: goal variables partially mediating trait social anxiety and trait social anxiety partially mediating goal variables in predicting anticipatory NA. Thus, there remained no evidence that trait social anxiety simply mediated the effects for goal variables.
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Acknowledgments
For research assistance, thanks to: Kate Chowpaknam, William Hoffman III, Tiffany Frye, Alison Kraus, Esther Leung, Gita Narayan, Dianna Schonfield, and Fannie Zhou. For helpful comments on a previous draft, thanks to Richard G. Heimberg and Alison Cohn.
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Rodebaugh, T.L., Shumaker, E.A. Avoidance Goals for a Specific Social Situation Influence Activated Negative and Positive Affect. Cogn Ther Res 36, 36–46 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-010-9313-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-010-9313-3