Social Anxiety and Its Relationship with Irrational Thoughts Among Secondary School Students in Toor Albaha Directorate

Abstract

The aim of this study was to uncover the relationship between social anxiety and irrational thoughts among secondary school students in Tur Al-Baha district. In order to find out the prevalence of social anxiety and irrational thoughts, and to identify the differences between students according to gender, the researcher used the descriptive-relational method, and the sample consisted of 315 male and female students who were selected by stratified random method. Codified tools were used to measure social anxiety and irrational thoughts after verifying their authenticity and consistency. The results of the study showed that there is a statistically significant negative correlation between the level of prevalence of social anxiety and the level of prevalence of irrational thoughts among secondary school students in Tur Al-Baha district with a correlation coefficient of = .128(*) at the value of the significance level = .0230. This means that the higher the level of social anxiety among high school students in Tur Al-Baha district, the lower their level of irrational thoughts. This disparity may be due to the difference in cultural environments, as many psychological theories (such as Alice's rational emotional therapy) assume that social anxiety is associated with irrational thoughts such as fear of evaluating others and exaggerating expected disasters. The results of the study also revealed that the level of social anxiety came at a high prevalence level. It also revealed the existence of statistically significant differences in social anxiety in favor of males, and it also showed that there were statistically significant differences in irrational thoughts in the areas of emotional apathy, avoidance of problems, annoyance with the troubles of others, and seeking complete solutions in favor of males.