Tyler's Thought on Public Speaking Phobias

453 phobias exist in the world today. You fear darkness, sitting, ugliness, nudity (looks like they’re not getting any), everything, colors, bathing, sitting in a car and 445 other things. 13% of the population suffers from a social phobia, some more common than others. Public speaking phobia affects the largest number of individuals with social phobias, 40% to be exact. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) treats public speaking phobia when in session with a therapist. While CBT is preferred, problems can arise in the treatments. Such problems include lack of therapist control, patient’s inability to imagine and audience, self flooding of emotions and loss of confidentiality when put in front of a real audience. A new method of CBT has been invented called virtual CBT (VRCBT), where a fake audience is used to simulate the real situation. A study has been done and is explained in Behavioral Modification Journal. that tests whether VRCBT is a better alternative to conventional CBT.

People with public speaking phobia perceive communication in front of others as dangerous and feared, sort of like talking to the hottest girl in school. Anxiety builds up and manifests as physical symptoms such as sweating, loss of words, redness and shortness of break. Avoidance of such situations then becomes the next step. Patients do not confront their fears thus they build up and manifest in their brain. Many times they overestimate the threat of public ridicule and disapproval and tend to catastrophize negative consequences and personal events that have no relation to them.

Cognitive behavioral therapy treats the most symptoms in patients. The most common component to CBT includes exposing patients to stimuli, in this case people listening. The client experiences two things while in therapy, they have a lessened sense of anxiety during exposure and they learn no catastrophic even is coming as they anticipated. Exposure to their fear may be done in two ways, by natural setting or by imagination. In natural exposure the patient actually speaks in front of live people; however this becomes very time consuming and expensive. The therapist also loses some of their control over the situation, for they cannot make the people suddenly disappear if something goes wrong. Running into someone the client knows at these public events also becomes a problem because everyone will now know he or she is in therapy. In imaginative exposure the patients visualizes and audience in their heads. This manner is less effective because therapists cannot tell if the patient is truly following directions or is thinking about other things. Other problems include an overflow of thought and dramatizing the situation.

Virtual CBT introduces a new way to perform therapy for people with public speaking phobias. It is already currently being used to treat other phobias such as fight phobia, fear of driving, claustrophobia and agoraphobia. New advances in technology allow for these virtual simulations to seem very life like. Exposure to the stimuli occurs in the same way expect the client but on a helmet connected to a computer to visualize his or her audience. The helmet system provides both visual and audio input. A special program allows the therapist to manipulate different elements of the scenery, allowing for gradual exposure. For example the operator can make the audience clap their hands, seem uninterested or get up and leave. (The exact view the patient has, the therapist has so their progress can be monitored).

VRCBT proved very effective in a recent study done on public speaking patients. 88 persons were tested with different methods of clinical help. The results were measured on how well the patients preformed behavioral tasks. The data showed men and women who were treated with VRCBT did better than those treated by other types of medicine. Overall the virtual therapy shows more improvement over conventional methods in quelling anxiety of patients as well as allowing therapist to control the environment more effectively. People with public speaking phobia perceive communication in front of others as dangerous and feared, sort of like talking to the hottest girl in school. Anxiety builds up and manifests as physical symptoms such as sweating, loss of words, redness and shortness of break. Avoidance of such situations then becomes the next step. Patients do not confront their fears thus they build up and manifest in their brain. Many times they overestimate the threat of public ridicule and disapproval and tend to catastrophize negative consequences and personal events that have no relation to them. Cognitive behavioral therapy treats the most symptoms in patients. The most common component to CBT includes exposing patients to stimuli, in this case people listening. The client experiences two things while in therapy, they have a lessened sense of anxiety during exposure and they learn no catastrophic even is coming as they anticipated. Exposure to their fear may be done in two ways, by natural setting or by imagination. In natural exposure the patient actually speaks in front of live people; however this becomes very time consuming and expensive. The therapist also loses some of their control over the situation, for they cannot make the people suddenly disappear if something goes wrong. Running into someone the client knows at these public events also becomes a problem because everyone will now know he or she is in therapy. In imaginative exposure the patients visualizes and audience in their heads. This manner is less effective because therapists cannot tell if the patient is truly following directions or is thinking about other things. Other problems include an overflow of thought and dramatizing the situation. Virtual CBT introduces a new way to perform therapy for people with public speaking phobias. It is already currently being used to treat other phobias such as fight phobia, fear of driving, claustrophobia and agoraphobia. New advances in technology allow for these virtual simulations to seem very life like. Exposure to the stimuli occurs in the same way expect the client but on a helmet connected to a computer to visualize his or her audience. The helmet system provides both visual and audio input. A special program allows the therapist to manipulate different elements of the scenery, allowing for gradual exposure. For example the operator can make the audience clap their hands, seem uninterested or get up and leave. (The exact view the patient has, the therapist has so their progress can be monitored). VRCBT proved very effective in a recent study done on public speaking patients. 88 persons were tested with different methods of clinical help. The results were measured on how well the patients preformed behavioral tasks. The data showed men and women who were treated with VRCBT did better than those treated by other types of medicine. Overall the virtual therapy shows more improvement over conventional methods in quelling anxiety of patients as well as allowing therapist to control the environment more effectively.