Talk Therapy Beats Medication When Curing Social Anxiety?

A new research published in The Lancet Psychiatry suggests that talk therapy is the better option than medication when treating people with social anxiety, according to Forbes.

Social phobia is a type of anxiety disorder where people have a deep fear of being judged by others or embarrassed in public, according to CBS News.

"Social anxiety is more than just shyness," said study author Evan Mayo-Wilson in a news release.

Mayo-Wilson added, "People with this disorder can experience severe impairment, from shunning friendships to turning down promotions at work that would require increased social interaction. The good news from our study is that social anxiety is treatable. Now that we know what works best, we need to improve access to psychotherapy for those who are suffering."

In the new study, Mayo-Wilson and his team from John Hopkins University, Oxford University and University College in London reportedly referred back to data from 101 earlier studies, including 13,000 people with severe and long-term social anxiety.

Some were assigned to various types of talk therapy while others were told to take medication. Some had both therapy and medication.

Those who went to talk therapy reportedly showed a greater improvement of symptoms than those in other groups. Cognitive behavioral therapy, also known as CBT, showed to be especially effective.

The authors of the study reportedly pointed out that the drawback of antidepressants was that the effects of the medications stopped as the treatment stopped. However, for therapy, the effects were mostly long-lasting.

"For this reason and because of the lower risk of side-effects, psychological interventions should be preferred over pharmacological interventions for initial treatment," the authors concluded.