Abstract:

Social anxious individuals usually show an important cognitive bias－interpretation bias, which refers to the tendency to interpret social situations in a more negative or threatening way. The present paper firstly introduced the paradigms usually used in this research field: homophone and homograph paradigm, ambiguous vignettes paradigm, reaction time paradigm and word sentence association paradigm. Then it summarized the characteristics of the interpretation bias in social anxiety, and expounded how attentional bias, attachment relationships, developmental experiences and reinforcement sensitivity of personality influenced interpretation bias. Finally, it proposed future directions: (1) the applicability of research paradigms; (2) the specificity of interpretation bias in social anxiety; (3) neurobiological researches of interpretation bias in social anxiety; (4) the different effects of positive and negative interpretations on social anxiety; (5) the effect of interpretation modification in socially anxious participants.

Key words: social anxiety, interpretation bias, attentional bias, modification of interpretation bias