5 - (SYM 72) Self-compassion Interventions and Their Effects Among Socially Anxious Adults:
A Scoping Review

Background: Self-compassion is increasingly emphasized in interventions for individuals high in self-criticism. Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is strongly linked with high self-criticism and low trait self-compassion. Thus, there is growing interest in enhancing self-compassion to reduce social anxiety. Among socially anxious adults, however, a gap exists in understanding the nature and efficacy of behavioral interventions focused on self-compassion (defined herein as single or multi-session interventions in which cultivating self-compassion comprised >50% of content).

 

Methods: The present scoping review systematically searched six databases to map research on self-compassion interventions for SAD and related symptoms, to achieve the following aims: (1) identify the types and efficacy of self-compassion interventions; (2) characterize the sociodemographic profiles of individuals studied to date; and (3) recommend future research directions.

 

Results: Ten articles that met inclusion criteria were identified. Seven included brief writing-based inductions, three examined psychotherapies, and two additionally evaluated contemplative exercises. All led to improvement in self-compassion or social anxiety symptoms at post-intervention within the self-compassion condition, often more so than waitlist or inactive controls, but not active comparators. Most studies (n = 6) evaluated university student samples, with largely white, female participants.

 

Conclusions: Findings on self-compassion-based interventions for SAD and related symptoms show promise for decreasing social anxiety symptoms and increasing reported self-compassion. However, more research is needed that specifically compares multi-session self-compassion interventions to active control conditions, uses multi-method measurement approaches to assess compassion and related outcomes (including social behavior and biological outcomes), distinguishes the effects of cultivating self-compassion from other active control conditions, examines enhancements to existing evidence-based treatment for SAD, recruits larger, more diverse samples, and assesses longer-term follow-up.