Does Cognitive Control Help or Hurt Social Anxiety? Conditional Effects of Response Inhibition on Safety Behavior Use and Post-event Processing

Abstract Purpose Although safety behaviors (SBs) and post-event processing (PEP) play an important role in the maintenance of social anxiety, less is known about the individual differences that might influence one’s use of these maladaptive cognitive-behavioral regulatory strategies. This study examined whether response inhibition, a form of cognitive control involving one’s ability to override automatic impulses, moderated the relationship between social anxiety and engagement in SBs and PEP. Methods Adults with high and low levels of social anxiety completed a stop-signal task (SST) measuring response inhibition abilities, then completed self-report assessments of past-week SB use ( n = 192) and PEP ( n = 183) following an impromptu laboratory speech task one week later. Results Moderation analyses revealed that social anxiety levels interacted with response inhibition abilities to predict both SBs and PEP, but in unexpected directions. While higher response inhibition abilities predicted lower levels of SBs and PEP for those with low social anxiety, this pattern was reversed for those with high social anxiety, for whom better response inhibition was associated with higher levels of SBs and PEP. Conclusions Findings indicate that response inhibition is not universally protective; rather, its effects might depend on symptom severity and individuals’ (mal)adaptive goals in social contexts. The implications of these findings for existing cognitive-behavioral models of social anxiety disorder are discussed.