The effect of alcohol on social phobic anxiety.

Previous research has demonstrated a greater than expected association between certain anxiety disorders and alcoholism. Social phobia has been found to co-occur often with alcohol problems. As a test of the effect of alcohol use on social phobic fear, 40 social phobics were asked to give two short speeches. Twenty received a placebo alcohol drink prior to both speeches and the other twenty subjects received placebo prior to the first speech followed by a moderate dose of alcohol before the second speech. Repeated measures analyses of variance yielded no significant differences in anxiety from speech one to speech two between the alcohol and the placebo groups. Family history of drinking problems, intoxication level, or past drinking habits did not significantly alter the effect of alcohol on anxiety. Subjects who believed they received alcohol experienced significantly lower subjective anxiety levels than subjects who did not believe they received alcohol. These results suggest that alcohol problems may be associated with social phobia because of the expectation that the beverage would relieve anxiety.PhDSocial Work and PsychologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/104631/1/9542859.pdfDescription of 9542859.pdf : Restricted to UM users only