I have always had social anxiety to some degree. I did find that working with the general public at various times over the years made it worse, or to rephrase it my tolerance of people decreased the more I did that kind of work. Even when I did not work those jobs for awhile and then came back to it, it was like i had only been gone a few minutes. I don't think it caused my problems, but it certainly highlighted some issues and pushed me to levels of stress that made me the last person that should deal with the general public in a business setting.