Why Parents Have The Most Influence On Socially Anxious Student’s Drug Use

Social anxiety is a term used to describe the presence of substantial feelings of unease, tension or fear in social settings that most individuals don’t view as particularly negative or harmful. People seriously affected by these feelings may qualify for a diagnosis of a mental health condition called social phobia or social anxiety disorder. In a study published in January 2014 in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, researchers from Louisiana State University examined the connection between social anxiety and the chances that a college undergraduate will use marijuana or other forms of cannabis. These researchers found that socially anxious people tend to use cannabis only when they believe that certain social norms support this behavior.

Identifying Social Anxiety Disorder

Doctors consider diagnosing social anxiety disorder in people whose levels of social anxiety interfere with their ability to maintain a reasonable sense of mental equilibrium or participate in various aspects of a typical daily routine. Symptoms commonly found in people affected by serious social anxiety include:

• fear of judgment from others
• unease in the presence of others
• difficulty communicating with others
• tendency to avoid voluntary social contact
• extreme self-consciousness or easy embarrassment
• difficulty establishing or maintaining friendships

Physical indicators of social anxiety are:

• nausea
• excessive sweating
• blushing in social situations

Most people first develop tendencies toward social anxiousness in early childhood or during their teenage years. Equal numbers of men and women experience symptoms profound enough to merit a social anxiety disorder diagnosis.

What Are Social Norms?

A social norm is a spoken or unspoken rule that helps govern the ways people interact in interpersonal, group or community settings. Some norms only operate on a relatively small scale (e.g., within a family or a close peer group), while others may operate on several levels or only on a broader social scale. As a rule, certain norms only have an effect when an individual believes that important or powerful people in his or her social group also endorse those norms. Other norms don’t necessarily receive an endorsement as acceptable behavior; nevertheless, they have an impact because an individual sees respected or influential people following them in everyday life. Broadly speaking, any person’s social environment is formed from a combination of norms he or she should follow and norms he or she actually follows.

Social Anxiety, Norms And Cannabis Use

In the study published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, the Louisiana State University researchers looked at the interactions between social anxiety, cannabis use and the desire to follow social norms. They conducted their work with the help of 230 undergraduates at the university who were known users of marijuana or some other form of cannabis (i.e., hashish or hashish oil). The researchers undertook their study for a couple of reasons. First, mental health professionals and addiction specialists know that socially anxious people may develop problems with marijuana use more often than the general population. In addition, despite this fact, researchers know very little about how social norms influence the drug-using behaviors of socially anxious people.

After analyzing the social anxiety levels, social norms regarding cannabis use and actual cannabis-related behaviors in the study participants, the researchers concluded that social norms do have a significant impact on the chances that a socially anxious person will or won’t use cannabis or develop significant cannabis-related problems. However, perhaps surprisingly, the main influencing norms come from college students’ parents, not their peers. When a socially anxious student believes that his or her parents have a favorable view of cannabis use, the odds for participation in cannabis use increase substantially. In addition, a socially anxious student who believes his or her parents follow pro-cannabis norms has a greater chance of developing relatively minor and relatively severe problems related to cannabis intake. Conversely, a college student affected by social anxiety tends not to get involved in cannabis use when his or her parents regularly express anti-cannabis points of view.

The authors of the study published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs do not discount the potential of social norms established among peers to influence a socially anxious college student’s chances of using cannabis or experiencing cannabis-related harm. However, they note that parental influences appear to play a much more prominent role. The study’s authors believe that their work can help deepen understanding of the factors that can potentially contribute to the onset of diagnosable cannabis use disorder (cannabis abuse or addiction) in people affected by social anxiety.

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