Measuring the Scale and Scope of Social Anxiety among Students in Pakistani Higher Education Institutions: An Alternative Social Anxiety Scale

In Sync: Inclusive school communities supporting students with anxiety

This study aimed to investigate the experiences of educators (working in inclusive schools) supporting students with anxiety and anxiety-related disorders.

Method

A qualitative refractive phenomenological case study was used to collect data from 44 participants (educators in various roles) in six Australian primary and secondary schools, which previous research identified as using inclusive practices to support a diverse range of students.

Results

Educators shared that they supported what they saw as learning needs using intrinsic, intuitive, and inclusive (3I's) ways of working. Interestingly, all educators reported that students felt supported despite a lack of explicit strategies focused on reducing anxiety. The 3I's were a way of working educators used to support all students, even though they experienced difficulties in recognising anxiety as behaviours were often internalised. This was particularly the case where disability and anxiety disorders co-occurred. Furthermore, educators did not identify evidence to support any one type of intervention being effective in mitigating anxiety.

Conclusions

The data suggests that there is a culture of inclusion reducing student anxiety, even though teachers and support staff may not have recognise the student's anxiety. Parents were mostly the first identifier of anxiety in their child. This research highlights the need for educators to engage in professional development around recognising anxiety and, secondly, in the implementation of specific strategies to support students with anxiety or anxiety-related disorders.

Examining the Latent Dimensions of Social Anxiety Disorder

While the body of literature has investigated the latent dimensions of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD), only few have directly anchored in the DSM-5 SAD symptoms. Similarly, a continuing issue on measuring mental health disorders pertains to whether a symptom's frequency, intensity, or both, are appropriate and sufficient indicators of severity. To address this gap, the present study developed and validated a DSM-5-based measurement tool, the Social Anxiety Symptom Severity Inventory (SASSI), which assesses both the intensity (intensity of disturbance) and frequency (frequency of occurrence) of SAD symptoms. In study 1 (n = 6458, college students), the results revealed a two-factor structure using exploratory structural equation modeling. In study 2 (n = 425, left-behind emerging adults), confirmatory factor analysis, measurement invariance testing, and latent class analysis were used. Findings demonstrated the importance of using both frequency and intensity of symptoms in assessing SAD severity. Moreover, a five-class solution best fitted the sample. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated the good psychometric properties of SASSI and filled an important gap among available measures in assessing SAD severity through symptom frequency and intensity.

Self-Consciousness, Self-Objectification, and Social Anxiety as Predictors of Photo Editing Behavior among Emerging Adults

This study aims to assess the impact of self-consciousness, self-objectification, and social anxiety on photo editing behavior among emerging adults. Correlational research strategy was used for the present quantitative research, and convenient sampling strategy was used to collect data of 444 university students (135 males and 309 females) with the age range of 18-25 years. The self-consciousness scale, objectified body consciousness scale, photo manipulation scale, and social anxiety scale were used as assessment tools for this study. For data analysis, $t$ -test for independent samples, correlation, and regression analysis were implied. The results revealed that women had higher self-consciousness and social anxiety in contrast to men. Moreover, self-objectification and evaluation anxiety were positively correlated with photo editing behavior. Lastly, overall self-objectification and body shame, one of the three aspects of self-objectification resulted as significant predictors of photo manipulation behavior among emerging adults. This study contributes to the indigenous literature of clinical and social psychology.

Impact of cognitive behavioural play therapy on social anxiety among school children with stuttering deficit: A cluster randomised trial with three months follow-up

BACKGROUND

Stuttering is a speech deficit which is characterized by obstruction of speech eloquence and verbal expression in addition to involuntary flow of air during communication. School children with communication deficit often experience social anxiety in their immediate environment. Currently, reports show that a good number of children with communication deficits are prone to social maladjustment due to their being socially inept. And this has significantly affected their thought pattern, social behaviours and emotional responses. In view of this, we examined the impact of cognitive behavioural play therapy in reducing social anxiety among school children with stuttering.

METHOD

This is a pretest-posttest randomized control group design. Participants were 178schoolchildren in inclusive schools in South east Nigeria. Participants in the intervention group were treated using cognitive behavioural play therapy programme (CBPT). Participants in the waitlist control group were only assessed at three points of assessment. Data analyses were completed using repeated measures ANOVA.

RESULTS

The results show that cognitive behavioural play therapy is beneficial in decreasing schoolchildren's social anxiety scores. The intervention equally showed the considerable impacts on the children when exposed to cognitive behavioural play programme at different times of assessment compared to waitlisted control group.

CONCLUSION

It is concluded that CBPT is a long-term psychotherapeutic programme that has significant impacts in reducing social anxiety among children with stuttering. This study makes a leading contribution on the limited scholarship focusing on the impact of CBPT on social anxiety of special population with stuttering deficits in developing countries.

Linking Work-Family Conflict (WFC) and Talent Management: Insights from a Developing Country

Considering the profound societal change taking place in several developing countries, the objective of this paper is to reflect on work-family conflict (WFC) both as a concept and a social phenomenon. Given that WFC is a concept rooted in academic debate focusing on developments in Western, largely individualistic, societies, this paper reconsiders WFC’s value added as applied in a context of a collectivist society in a developing country. The objective of this paper is thus threefold, i.e., (i) to assess WFC’s applicability in a context of a collectivist society in a developing country, where the position and role of women gradually changes; (ii) to develop a culturally adjusted/sensitive scale to measure the scope of WFC in Pakistan, whereby the latter is treated here as a case study; and (iii) to reflect on the possibility of devising a set of good practices that would allow a smooth inclusion of women in the formal workforce, while at the same time mitigating the scope and scale of WFC. The value added of this paper stems from these three objectives.