{"title":"<i>Nobody's \"Prfect\"!</i> The effect of manipulating perfectionism on social anxiety symptoms.","authors":"Anishka Jean, Hattie Murphy, Grace Sullivan, Lauren Swarr, Sabrina Siegan, Ayah Aldebyan, Shari A Steinman","doi":"10.1080/10615806.2025.2463959","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Social anxiety is a common experience that ranges from mild, temporary distress to excessive, persistent, and impairing fear. The current study tested whether perfectionism contributes to social anxiety symptoms and post-event processing (PEP) in the context of a contract-based manipulation to shift perfectionism. The manipulation asked participants to perform everything to a specific standard level for the following 24 hrs to shift perfectionism. Participants completed measures of social anxiety and perfectionism before delivering a speech. Next, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions: High Personal Standards, High Personal Standards with Evaluative Concerns (High PS+EC), and Low Personal Standards. The following day, participants completed the same measures, including a measure on PEP related to the speech. Consistent with hypotheses, results suggest that the contract manipulation significantly altered perfectionism, such that participants in the High PS+EC condition had an increase in perfectionism over time. Contrary to expectations, the contract manipulation did not affect social anxiety symptoms or PEP. Results suggest that focusing on evaluation concerns, rather than personal standards alone, may contribute to perfectionism. It is possible that a stronger or larger dose of the manipulation is needed to see effects on social anxiety symptoms.</p>","PeriodicalId":51415,"journal":{"name":"Anxiety Stress and Coping","volume":" ","pages":"1-12"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3000,"publicationDate":"2025-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Anxiety Stress and Coping","FirstCategoryId":"102","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/10615806.2025.2463959","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"PSYCHIATRY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Social anxiety is a common experience that ranges from mild, temporary distress to excessive, persistent, and impairing fear. The current study tested whether perfectionism contributes to social anxiety symptoms and post-event processing (PEP) in the context of a contract-based manipulation to shift perfectionism. The manipulation asked participants to perform everything to a specific standard level for the following 24 hrs to shift perfectionism. Participants completed measures of social anxiety and perfectionism before delivering a speech. Next, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions: High Personal Standards, High Personal Standards with Evaluative Concerns (High PS+EC), and Low Personal Standards. The following day, participants completed the same measures, including a measure on PEP related to the speech. Consistent with hypotheses, results suggest that the contract manipulation significantly altered perfectionism, such that participants in the High PS+EC condition had an increase in perfectionism over time. Contrary to expectations, the contract manipulation did not affect social anxiety symptoms or PEP. Results suggest that focusing on evaluation concerns, rather than personal standards alone, may contribute to perfectionism. It is possible that a stronger or larger dose of the manipulation is needed to see effects on social anxiety symptoms.
期刊介绍:
This journal provides a forum for scientific, theoretically important, and clinically significant research reports and conceptual contributions. It deals with experimental and field studies on anxiety dimensions and stress and coping processes, but also with related topics such as the antecedents and consequences of stress and emotion. We also encourage submissions contributing to the understanding of the relationship between psychological and physiological processes, specific for stress and anxiety. Manuscripts should report novel findings that are of interest to an international readership. While the journal is open to a diversity of articles.