Social phobia (SP) is defined as a marked and persistent fear of social or

performance situations in which embarrassment may occur (DSM-IV-TR:

American Psychiatric Association. 2000). SP is multi-determined, and its
emergence in childhood is particularly detrimental for optimal socioemotional
development (Beidel et al., 2001; Beidel & Turner, 1998; Mancini et al., 1996:
Van Ameringen et al.. 2003). Although research over the last two decades suggests
a temperamental bias (e.g., early behavioral inhibition and shyness) toward SP in
some children (for extensive reviews, see Beidel & Turner. 1998: Kagan. 1994).
there has been relatively little attention directed toward examining the
contribution of familial factors such as parental psychopathology and their
influence on the development of SP in children. Still fewer studies have taken a
psycho physiological approach to understanding these relations.
One reason for the lack of research attention in this area may be related to
the fact that because adults who are shy and socially anxious prolong marriage
and parenthood (Caspi, et al., 1988), this obviously reduces the total number of
children they ultimately have. As well, adults who are extremely

PSYCHOPHYSIOLOGY IN CHILDREN OF SOCIAL PHOBICS

shy (particularly males) avoid intimate relationships and tend not to have children
altogether (Gilmartin, 1987). If adults with SP do have children, it is challenging
for them to bring their children to the laboratory, given that a major symptom of
the disorder is to avoid social encounters. There also may be other issues on the

part of the parent such as reluctance to self disclosure of their disorder to other
family members, thus reducing the like hood of ever seeking treatment.
There have been some attempts within the last decade to examine patterns
of resting frontal EEG activity in children whose parents arc afflicted with
psychopathology. In a series of studies. Field and colleagues have noted a
disruption in normal behavioral exchanges between mother and child in children
of depressed mothers (e.g., Field. 1992, 1995: Field et al., 2004; Field et al., 1990)
and distinct patterns of resting frontal EEG activity. Overall, Field and her
colleagues have found that infants and children of depressed mothers exhibit
greater relative right frontal EEG activity at rest compared to children of nondepressed mothers (Field et al.. 1995: Jones et. al., 2000; Jones et al., 1997: Jones
et al.. 1998: Jones et al.. 1997: Jones et. al.. 2004: Jones, Schmidt, & Field,
submitted).
There is a growing literature noting that typically developing children and
adults who are shy, anxious, or depressed exhibit a distinct pattern of frontal EEG
activity at rest. These patterns include greater relative right frontal EEG activity
and heightened overall frontal EEG activity. Both patterns of frontal activation at
rest are thought to be markers of emotion deregulation and arc known to he
predictive of socio emotional problems (see Davidson, 2000: Fox, 1991, 1994:
Schmidt & Fox, 2002, for reviews).
The present pilot study attempted to extend these early findings reported in
the extant literature by examining the pattern of resting frontal brain electrical
activity (EEG) in a group of children whose parents were clinically diagnosed

with SP. To the authors knowledge, no studies have examined the relation
between parental social phobia and the pattern of resting frontal EEG activity in
their children. Given that children of depressed mothers exhibit patterns of resting
frontal EEG activity that are similar to those lound in typically developing
anxious and depressed children and adults (see Davidson, 2000: Fox. 1991. 1994:
Fox et al.. 1995, 1996. 2001; Henriques & Davidson, 1991; Schmidt & Fox. 2002:
Schmidt et al., 1999; Theall-Honey & Schmidt, 2006), ii was predicted that
children of parents clinically diagnosed with SP would exhibit patterns of resting
frontal EEG activity similar to those found in temperamentally shy and socially
anxious children and adults. Specifically, we predicted that children of parents
with SP would exhibit greater relative resting right frontal EEG activity and
higher overall resting frontal EEG activity compared to typically developing
children.

METHOD
Participants
Children of Social Phobic Parents. Six right-handed children (3 males. 3 females)
who ranged in age from 6 to 14 years (M 10.67 years, SD = 2.88) and who had a
biological parent with a primary DSM-IV diagnosis of SP (American Psychiatric
Association, 2000) were recruited. Their parents were identified from the current
patients at the Anxiety Disorders Clinic, Hamilton Health Sciences. McMaster
University Medical Centre. The authors recruited a random sample of patients
from the Anxiety Disorders Clinic based on their willingness to participate. All

patients had a structured DSM-IV interview (Structured Clinical Interview for

DSM-IV Personality Disorders, [ISCID-II]; First et al.. 1997): four patients had
diagnosis of generalized social phobia: one patient had nongeneralized social
phobia. The SCID was performed by an experienced clinician. (It is also
important to note that one parent had two children participating in the study.) All
hut one parent had at least one comorbid diagnosis.
Comparison Group Children. Seven typically developing right-handed children (3
males, 4 females: (M = 10.14 years. SD = 2.20) were selected to serve as a
comparison group. These children were chosen from a child database in the
Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour containing the birth
records of healthy children horn at McMaster Medical Centre. All the comparison
children were Caucasian. and from middle-income households living in the
Hamilton. Ontario region. All comparison children and their parents were healthy
and free of psychiatric illness and familial history of psychiatric problems.
Importantly, the parents with social phobia and the parents of the
comparison children did not differ on age, race, SES, and handedness variables.
The children in the two groups did not differ in age. All participants were given a
toy prize and photograph of them wearing the EEG cap upon the completion of
the study as a token of appreciation for their participation.
Procedures
Informed consent was obtained for all participants and their parent(s) prior to
beginning any procedures. After the child had a chance to acclimate to the lab, he

or she was directed into a testing room, seated in a comfortable chair, and the
EEG cap was placed on his or her head. The child was instructed to relax and to
keep movements to a minimum. hut not to he overly concerned about doing so.
During this time, the parent (usually the mother) was in an adjacent room
completing the shyness subscale of the Colorado Childhood Temperament
Inventory (CCTI; Buss & Plomin, 1984; Rowe & Plomin, 1977). a widely used
measure to index childhood temperament. A sample item from the 5-item shyness
subscalc includes: Child tends to he shy. Items are answered on a I (not at all,
strongly disagree) to 5 (a lot, strongly agree) metric. Reliability and validity data
for the measure are provided in Buss and Plomin (1984) and Rowe and Plomin
(1977).
Following EEG recording, the cap and electrodes were removed, and the
child was led to the laboratory playroom where he or she was observed for I mm
during a self-presentation task. With the parent in an adjacent room watching on a
closed-circuit TV. the experimenter instructed the child to stand on a designated
spot on the floor in front of a video camera. The experimenter then asked the child
to talk about what he or she did at his or her last birthday party.
The child was prompted with open and closed questions about his or her
last birthday party approximately every 20 s if necessary (e.g.. Did you have a
cake? and What kinds of games did you play?). This procedure is known to
induce self-presentation anxiety in children (Theall-Honey & Schmidt. 2006). The
videotape was subsequently coded by independent observers for verbal (e.g.,
latency and duration of speech) and nonverbal (e.g., self-manipulations, fidgeting)

measures of anxiety. and inter-rater reliability was established on the individual

behavioral measures (kappas ranged lrom .6 to .8).
Electroencephalogram (EEG) Data Collection and Reduction
EEG Recording. Regional EEG was collected during a 2 mm resting condition (1
min eyes-open (EO), 1 min eyes-closed (EC)1 using a lycra stretch cap. The cap
electrodes were positioned according to the 10/20 system of the International
Federation (Jasper. 1958). EEG was recorded in the left and right anterior and
posterior regions of the brain (i.e.. mid-frontal: F3, F4; central: C3. C4: parietal:
P3. P4: and occipital: 01. 021 referenced to the common vertex (Cz). Two gels
(Omni Prep to prepare the scalp. and Electro-Gel to serve as a conduit between the
scalp and each electrode site) were applied to the nine sites. Impedances below 10
K ohms for each electrode site were considered acceptable. The nine sites were
amplified using SA Instrumentation Bioamplifers with bandpass filters set at 1 Hz
(high pass) and 100 Hz (low pass). The EEG data were digitized online at a
sampling rate of 512 Hz.
EEG Data Reduction and Quantification. The EEG data were visually scanned.
and all artifact due to movement (e.g., eye blinks, body movements) was edited
out using software developed by James Long Company (EEG Analysis Program,
Caroga Lake, NY). If artifact was present in one channel, then data in all channels
were excluded. All artifact free EEG data were analyzed using a discrete Fourier
transform (DFT), with a Hanning window of 1 s width and 50% overlap. EEG
power in the Alpha 1(8 to 10 Hz) frequency hand was derived separately for the

EQ and EC conditions. This frequency band width was used because it contained
a majority of the EEG power and is known to he related to indiidual differences in
affective style (Schmidt & Fox, 1994). Because EEG power in EO and EC
conditions was highly related (p < .01). the two conditions were combined to form
a composite measure of resting EEG power separately for each region. This
composite measure produces a more reliable estimate of EEG activity than
separate EO and EC conditions (Tomarken et al.. 1992).
RESULTS
In order to examine whether the two groups of children differed on the measure of
resting frontal EEG activity in the Alpha I hand, an analysis of variance (ANOVA)
with Group (Children of SP Parents, Comparison Group Children) as a betweensubjects factor and Region (midfrontal. central, parietal, occipital) and
Hemisphere (left, right) as within-subjects factors was performed. The analysis
revealed a significant main effect for Region [F(3. 33) = 21.71. p < .0005.
Pairwise f-tests confirmed that there was significantly more overall EEG activity
(i.e., less EEG power) in the frontal region compared to posterior regions [parictal
t(12) = 2.45, p < .03; occipital t(12) 4.48, p < .0011 regardless of Group.
The analysis also revealed a significant Group X Region interaction on
resting EEG alpha power [F(3, 33) = 4.69, p < .008 1. In order to decompose this
interaction, we computed separate between-subjects f-tests with Group as a
between-subjects factor on overall alpha power in each region (e.g.. F3 power +
F4 power).

As predicted. children of parents with social phobia exhibited significantly

less overall alpha power (i.e.. more overall activation) in the frontal region.
compared to the typically developing children [t(ll) = 2.14, p = .05] (see Figure 1).
The between-group differences were specific to the mid-frontal site, The betweengroup differences on overall resting alpha I EEG power in the posterior sites were
not significant. Although. as predicted, children of parents with social phobia
tended to exhibit greater relative right frontal EEG activity (i.e.. less power in the
right versus left frontal EEG site), this difference only approached statistical
significance [F(1. 11) = 2.56. p > .05 (see Figure 1).
There were no between-group differences on any of the behavioral
measures collected, nor on the CCTI shyness subseale.
DISCUSSION
This study found that children with at least one parent clinically diagnosed with
social phobia exhibited significantly higher overall frontal EEG activity and
tended to exhibit greater relative right frontal EEG activity compared with
typically developing children of healthy parents. What do differences in overall
resting frontal EEG power reflect? The present author (Schmidt, 1999; Schmidt &
Fox. 2002) and others (Dawson. 1994: Henriqucs & Davidson. 1991) have
speculated that, while the pattern of resting frontal EEG asymmetry may reflect a
predisposition to experience different types of emotion, the pattern of overall
frontal activity, on the other hand. may reflect a predisposition in terms of the
intensity with which emotion is experienced. Greater relative right frontal EEG

activity at rest is known to predict depressed and socially anxious styles (for a
review, see Davidson, 2000: Schmidt& Fox. 2002), whereas heightened activity in
both frontal hemispheres at rest is known to predict socially anxious profiles (see
Schmidt, 1999: Schmidt & Fox, 2002. for a review). The preliminary findings are
consistent with these ideas and suggest that children of parents with social phobia
may exhibit these psycho physiological vulnerabilities, which arc predictive of
emotion regulatory problems during development, prior to the emergence of any
behavioral disturbances in the child.
There were several limitations of this pilot investigation that must be
noted. First, the two groups of children did not differ on the maternal report
measure of shyness or on any of the individual behavioral measures coded. The
lack of group differences may have been because (a) the sample size in the present
study was too small to detect differences on these various measures. and/or (h) it
was too early in development to observe the behavioral expression of
socioemotional problems in children of parents with SP. Second, the age range
was relatively wide for the target group from ages 6 to 14. There are significant
developmental brain and behavioral changes occurring at these ages that have the
potential to confound the results. The wide age range may have been responsible
for failure to find effects. Third. all hut one patient/parent had co-morbid
symptoms that could have potentially confounded the results. That is. comorbid
symptoms could have influenced the target disorder and relevant effects. Fourth,
all hut one of the patients had the generalized form of social phobia. The
generalized form is known to have a stronger heritable component than the

nongeneralized form, so the frontal EEG measures may have been tapping more
biological/genetic similarities between children and parents than influences of
parental psychopathology. Fifth, the present study did not measure whether the
patients had concerns about anxiety in their children. Because some
patients/parents with such concerns may he more apt to volunteer for the present
type of study, motivation and self-selection biases of the patients/parents who
volunteered had the potential to confound the results. Future studies need to be
conducted with a larger sample size, a more homogenous age range, inclusion of
structure interviews for the children, and control of co-morbid symptoms and tipe
and severity of social phobia in the patient/parent in order to ensure the reliability
and generalizability of the present findings.
The findings from the present pilot study appear to be the first to note
distinct patterns of resting frontal EEG activity in children of parents clinically
diagnosed with SP. These preliminary results suggest that parental social phobia
may adversely impact the childs psycho physiological well-being by transmuting
the features of the disorder to their offspring either genetically or environmentally
or both. Given that gene-environment interactions are known to play role in the
development of social anxiety in children (Fox et al., 2005). future studies would
he wise to examine multiple measures of genetic and environmental variability of
behavioural inhibition in the offspring of social phohics.
One of the challenges facing future work with this population is locating
and testing the children of parents with social phobia. As well, given that the
collection of regional EEG measures is a relatively noninvasive procedure that can

he used with young infants, a larger follow-up study of children of parents with
SP earlier in the childs life may provide important data on whether these highrisk children will go on to develop the disorder themselves or present with any of
its symptoms. Once these psycho physiological risk factors are identified, a
program of early intervention and prevention could he designed to help treat the
at-risk children of parents with SP. thereby reducing the potential impact of the
disorder before it fully develops in the child.