Performance of Working Memory Updating in Socially Anxious Individuals

Working memory updating plays a critical role in executive function. Few studies explored the working memory updating in socially anxious individuals. In this study, we wanted to explore the working memory updating in socially anxious individuals. We studied this issue by instructing participants to perform an emotional 2-back task, and recording their response time and accuracy. We found that high socially anxious individuals showed significant longer response time in positive word condition than that of negative and neutral words. But there was no significant difference in word type in low socially anxious group. In accuracy, we did not observe any significant difference in group, word type, and their interaction. These results indicate that socially anxious individuals have deficits in positive content updating, which have an important implication for developing method to reduce social anxiety.