Presenter: Ruben S. Rodriguez
Poster Description: The objective of this study was to investigate the prevalence of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) in Northern New Mexico. Epistemological studies indicate that SAD is one of the most prevalent mental disorders with roughly 5-12 percent of the U.S. population meeting criteria for a diagnosis (Avramchuk, 2018 & Miloyan, Bulley, Brilot & Suddendorf, 2017). Presenting symptoms of SAD are persistent fear of embarrassment or humiliation, stuttering, social phobia, paranoid thinking, and avoidance behaviors (Avramchuk, 2018; Khalid-Khan, Santibanez, McMicken, & Rynn, 2007; Lee-Won, Herzog, & Park, 2015; Menzies et al., 2019; Miloyan et al., 2017; Pisano, 2016; Taheri, Amiri, Birashk, & Gharrayi, 2016). SAD negatively impacts the life of those who suffer from this mental disorder at various levels such as professional, educational, and economic (Avramchuk, 2018) and is believed to have comorbidity with other common disorders such as Alcohol Use Disorder (Miloyan et al., 2017) which increases the probabilities of the prevalence of this mental illness. Treatments that have been used to alleviate the symptoms of SAD include Cognitive Behavioral Therapy as individuals and group therapy, Behavioral Activation Therapy as individuals and group therapy (Khalid-Khan et al., 2007; Menzies et al., 2019) as well as pharmaceuticals pharmacotherapy.