Comparison of the Effectiveness of Face-to-face and Internet-based Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy on Cognitive Distortions and Emotion Regulation in Adolescents with Social Anxiety Disorder

Abstract

People with social anxiety face barriers to treatment under the pretext of avoiding interaction and the discomfort of self-disclosure. Using remote health services may be an alternative, but there is no research evidence on the effectiveness of Internet-based methods in social anxiety.Therefore, this study aimed to compare the effectiveness of face-to-face and Internet-based cognitive-behavioral therapy on cognitive distortions and emotion regulation in adolescents with social anxiety.The present study was a field experiment. A total of 51 adolescents with social anxiety disorder were selected by cluster sampling method and randomly assigned to three face-to-face, Internet-based, and control therapy groups. Three groups were interviewed at the beginning and end of the study and answered the social anxiety screening questionnaire (SASA) Levpušček & Videc (2008 ), cognitive distortion questionnaire (CDQ) Beck and Wismann(1978), and emotion regulation questionnaire (ERQ) Jojn and Gross(2003).The two experimental groups underwent therapeutic intervention during ten weekly sessions.The results of ANKOVA analysis showed that both forms of intervention effectively reduced cognitive distortions, improved emotion regulation, and reduced symptoms of social anxiety.Also, the results of MANKOVA analysis showed that in the components of the need to please others and repression, face-to-face intervention only was effective.None of the intervention methods significantly affected the two components of success and perfectionism. In general, in all variables, the impact of the face-to-face intervention was greater than the Internet-based intervention.These results can support the use of Internet-based cognitive-behavioral therapy for adolescents with social anxiety disorder who, due to circumstances, are unable to benefit from face-to-face treatment

Keywords

• cognitive distortions
• cognitive-behavioral therapy
• emotion regulation
• social anxiety disorder