[SoupDragon]

I was listening to a radio show and there was a discussion about anxiety. Someone said that while more men than women tend to suffer from social anxiety, more women than men suffer from agrophobia - they then posed the question as to whether these are the same conditions? Just wondered whether anyone on here had a view?

[Callmebj]

Soup, IMHO, I'm sure these problems can go hand in hand. I don't think that most with social anxiety necessarily will have the symptoms of agoraphobia, likely most will not.
Agoraphobia will obviously remove people from social settings, but I'm not too sure that their fear is motivated toward people but maybe to outside world in general. You made me think, now doggone...gotta look that up. Hugs, bj

[whoswho]

According to current diagnosis criteria, Agoraphobia and Social Anxiety are two different anxiety disorders. Agoraphobia is technically a subset of Panic Disorder. It occurs when someone with Panic Disorder becomes afraid of having a panic attack in settings that are difficult to escape from: most social settings, driving on the freeway, etc. Slowly, the agoraphobic person begins to avoid these places entirely or will only go with a "safe" person accompanying them. Sometimes there will be a "safety" radius around someone's house; they will only travel so many miles away, etc. But not everyone who has Panic Disorder will develop Agoraphobia.

I think the new DSM is going to make Agoraphobia its own category separate from Panic Disorder, though this is not confirmed.

It is common for anxiety disorders to overlap. I've been diagnosed with Panic Disorder/Agoraphobia, Social Anxiety AND Generalized Anxiety. So let's just say I'm a very anxious person...

[lancetrot]

A study of the convergence between SAD and agoraphobia exposed that the disorders are more probably to co-occur in women, and while both disorders are existing, the course tends to be more severe.
sources: Degonda M, Angst J. The Zurich study: XX. Social phobia and agoraphobia. European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience. 1993;243(2):95-102.