Antecedents and accompanying symptoms of social anxiety and social phobia reported by mothers

Forty-nine mothers of socially anxious and 25 mothers of socially non-anxio us children participated in the study. Of the socially anxious children 17 had the diagnosis of a social phobia. The mothers completed questionnaires on the antecedents and accompanying symptoms of their children's anxieties, on their own anxieties and the anxieties of the target child's siblings an d the biological father. According to these reports, the groups of socially anxious children with and without the diagnosis of a social phobia differe d marginally from each other with regard to antecedents and accompanying sy mptoms of social anxiety. The socially anxious children had been more quiet and more affectionate as babies and had shown persisting problems with get ting adapted to the kindergarden. In addition, they showed more frequent se lf-talk and a hightened tendency to worry; these behaviors may be indicator s of high self-focused attention. Data also show a concordance for the spec ific fears experienced by mother and child.