Social Anxiety and Selective Mutism

Social anxiety is not a free choice. It’s estimated that 7 in 1,000 children have "selective mutism" (SM), one type of social anxiety that renders children absolutely silent in public (e.g. they never speak up in class), even when they are normally talkative at home.

According to an article in Time magazine, SM has a strong genetic component because it runs in families. Until about 15 years ago, the condition was known as "elective mutism, which suggests the silence is willful and controlling. It was seen as a power struggle that manifested as a refusal to speak … Now it is characterized as a failure to speak". Until the late 1980’s, SM was falsely attributed to "emotional or physical abuse … even though there was no proof".

So, yet again, the notion of free will is found to be hollow. The interesting question now is understanding how the brain manifests SM. Clearly, a learned ability (i.e. recognizing that one is in a public place) is exploited by the genes, which then switch off another learned ability (i.e. the ability to speak). This implies that the development of the brain decides where to place those abilities, so it can later harness the neurons involved for other purposes.

Another interesting question is determining why the incidence of SM is 7 in 1,000 children.  Over the course of evolution, it must have been determined that having this rate of SM was beneficial to society, in the overall distribution of traits.

Social anxiety is not a free choice. It’s estimated that 7 in 1,000 children have "selective mutism" (SM), one type of social anxiety that renders children absolutely silent in public (e.g. they never speak up in class), even when they are normally talkative at home.

According to an article in Time magazine, SM has a strong genetic component because it runs in families. Until about 15 years ago, the condition was known as "elective mutism, which suggests the silence is willful and controlling. It was seen as a power struggle that manifested as a refusal to speak … Now it is characterized as a failure to speak". Until the late 1980’s, SM was falsely attributed to "emotional or physical abuse … even though there was no proof".

So, yet again, the notion of free will is found to be hollow. The interesting question now is understanding how the brain manifests SM. Clearly, a learned ability (i.e. recognizing that one is in a public place) is exploited by the genes, which then switch off another learned ability (i.e. the ability to speak). This implies that the development of the brain decides where to place those abilities, so it can later harness the neurons involved for other purposes.

Another interesting question is determining why the incidence of SM is 7 in 1,000 children.  Over the course of evolution, it must have been determined that having this rate of SM was beneficial to society, in the overall distribution of traits.

Comments

[foilwwoman]

I know this comment comes way too late for a response, but maybe you could email me one. What would be the possible benefit of having people who don't just tend to be quiet in public, but can't speak in public? I'm just not getting where that would be an advantage.