In CBT sessions, therapy homework, or supported self-help at home, this module can help adults and older teenagers notice the subtle avoidance habits that keep social anxiety and social phobia going. It focuses on safety behaviours, why they feel useful in the moment, and how to begin testing fears more directly through behavioural experiments.
This Social Anxiety Safety Behaviours CBT workbook PDF is a practical resource for exploring the habits people use to feel safer in social situations, and how those habits can sometimes keep anxiety going. It offers clear psychoeducation for adults and older teenagers working on social anxiety, social phobia, fear of embarrassment, avoidance, self-consciousness and anxious social interactions. Examples include wearing headphones to avoid conversation, staying quiet in tutorials or meetings, avoiding eye contact, over-rehearsing what to say, relying on alcohol or drugs to cope, choosing inconspicuous clothes, keeping the focus on other people, or carrying medication for reassurance.
The worksheets guide users to identify the purpose of each safety behaviour, what they fear might happen without it, and what actually happens when it is reduced in a planned way. This makes the resource useful for CBT sessions, therapy homework, supported self-help, university wellbeing support, small group work, or one-to-one conversations with a practitioner.
It can be used to:
- map common avoidance patterns before planning behavioural experiments;
- support reflection after social situations, lessons, meetings or everyday conversations;
- create gradual practice tasks that test anxious predictions more directly.
Download or print the workbook pages to use as session handouts, home learning sheets, revision prompts for coping plans, or a structured guide for noticing which behaviours are helping in the short term but limiting confidence over time.
