Social Anxiety/Phobia Group
The group will not be running until further notice.
A specialised Cognitive and Behavioural Therapy group designed for the treatment of Social Anxiety. Most people suffering from social anxiety may be reluctant in joining a group because it is often in group situation that they experience high level of anxiety. However, this group offers a safe environment to explore and challenge unhelpful patterns of thinking and behaving and an opportunity to practice new coping strategies. Group members offer support to each other, empathy and understanding.
What is Social Anxiety/Phobia
Social Anxiety can be defined as a fear of negative evaluation. The anxiety a person experiences in social situations ranges from shyness to extreme panic and anxiety. The anxiety can be experienced in all social situations or in very specific situations such as public speaking.
People experiencing social anxiety often feel self-conscious and fear that others will judge them negatively, humiliate them, reject them and so on. They tend to avoid social situations, and if they cannot avoid social contact, they put in place a series of safety behaviours to protect them from others seeing what they fear could be true about them. They hold negative beliefs about themselves since childhood and/or adolescence which get reinforced by their avoidance of social situations, their self-focussed attention and their safety behaviours.
The good news is that Cognitive and Behavioural Therapy is a short term, cost effective, powerful treatment for anyone experiencing social anxiety. CBT treatment in a specialised group increases learning and helps building confidence. .
What is Cognitive and Behavioural Therapy (CBT)
CBT looks at social anxiety as a self-fulfilling prophecy. People who feel socially anxious have a negative perception of themselves and they believe that people will judge them accordingly. Hence they feel self-conscious and work hard at hiding what they fear people will see about them. For example, they are constantly thinking of what to say next; consequently they experience a blank mind and often miss out bits of conversation. They avoid eye contact, go quiet, avoid giving opinions, avoid making phone calls, avoid speaking up in public and so on). As a result, others often experience them as shy, aloof, uninterested, uncaring and lacking confidence and self-esteem.
This in turn confirms their worst fears of being judged negatively. CBT aims at gaining an understanding of this vicious circle, learning helpful skills to cope with the anxiety and challenging the negative pattern of thinking and behaving as well as gaining confidence in social situations.
How does the group work?
This group is open to anyone who suffers from social anxiety. You do not need a referral to attend and I offer a complimentary assessment meeting before joining the group. It is ongoing and people attend the group for as long as they benefit from it, bearing in mind that a CBT treatment course for social anxiety typically takes 12 sessions. Because it is an open group, group members benefit from the learning experience, encouragement and understanding of other members. There is a maximum of 8 members at any given time. The group last for 2 hours: it is a CBT structured group and each member is asked to name their personal agenda (i.e. what they want to focus on during the session) and are given homework every week. The group typically starts with reviewing the homework of the previous week and addressing the difficulties and then moves on to addressing each member's agenda.About the fee
The fee for the session is £55. There is a lesser fee for students and unemployed.
Complimentary assessment
Before joining the group, there is a complimentary assessment session to help identify the difficulties, set up therapeutic goals and give you a sense of how CBT can help with Social Anxiety as well as answering any questions you may have. Once you have joined the group and gained confidence with the approach, the sessions can then be arranged fortnightly or monthly according to your needs.
If you have further questions, please contact Nathalie via this website.