Weekend course tackles fear of blushing

One of the symptoms of social anxiety can be a fear of blushing. A fear of blushing develops when people feel self-conscious, this makes them blush and feel even more self-conscious leading to a vicious circle developing. Researchers from Dresden Technical University used a weekend course of 'task concentration training' to help people suffering from a fear of blushing. Through reading stories, role-playing and watching themselves on video the participants practiced turning their focus away from themselves and to the task in hand - either the words of a conversational partner or the reading of a story. The participants were also given advice on how to practice re-directing their attention over the next six weeks, first in non-threatening situations and then in more difficult ones. At the end of the weekend 37% of the participants showed clinically significant improvement in their fear of blushing and at a six-month follow-up this had risen to 56%.

You can find out more about this research at

http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/05/can-fear-of-blushing-be-cured-in.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BpsResearchDigest+%28BPS+Research+Digest%29&utm_content=Google+Reader