Translational Issues in Psychological Science, Vol 12(1), Mar 2026, 30-41; doi:10.1037/tps0000485
Social anxiety is a distressing emotional condition characterized by extreme fear of rejection that shapes how and when individuals socialize. Although social interactions hold key information about social anxiety, we rarely study the everyday social lives of those with social anxiety. Research to date has relied on trait-based methods that lack ecological validity and overlook dynamic, intraindividual emotional changes. This article highlights the need for experience-sampling methods (ESM) to study social anxiety in naturally occurring contexts and provides guidance for doing so. We summarize new ESM research that reveals surprising findings: contrary to the assumption that socially anxious individuals avoid or dislike social interactions, people with social anxiety often experience increased motivation to socialize and derive positive emotional benefits from doing so. These findings challenge prevailing assumptions and underscore the need to study emotion dynamics, which can clarify underlying emotion regulation patterns (e.g., heightened sensitivity to daily experiences). To do so, we provide practical guidance for designing ESM studies, including survey schedules, survey types, measurement of emotion, and measurement of social interactions, as well as clinical applications of ESM to treat social anxiety. This article equips researchers with strategies for using ESM to better understand the real-world emotional experiences that underlie social anxiety. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)