ABSTRACT
Social anxiety disorder (SAD), also known as social phobia, was first recognized as a specific diagnostic entity in the late 1960s and was incorporated into the diagnostic nomenclature in the 1980s in the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III) (1). The term social phobia itself, however, has been in use since the early 1900s to characterize people with performance anxiety (2). In earlier editions (3, 4) of the DSM, social phobia had been subsumed under broader categories of phobic reaction or phobic neurosis. Specific diagnostic criteria for social phobia were established after research revealed that social phobia differed from other phobias in respect to such clinical features as age of onset and course (5). DSM-III criteria emphasized fear of performance situations such as speaking, writing, or eating in public or using public restrooms. DSM-III-R (6) and DSM-IV (7) subsequently broadened the definition to include fear and distress in most social situations.
