‘It’s in your gut’: Microbes in gut may contribute to social anxiety disorder, finds study

Social anxiety disorder (SAD) or social phobia is marked by feelings of fear, anxiety and distress in social situations, including talking to people, meeting new people, and attending parties or gatherings. It is a crippling psychiatric disorder that can disrupt a person’s life and may even affect everyday activities. But while phobias are typically said to be ‘all in your head’, a recent study shows how social phobia might be in a person’s gut.

A study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that people with social anxiety disorder not only have different gut microbes but can also affect their brain, paving the way for new possibilities for therapies.

What did the study find?

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Researchers believe that gut microbes could play a role in the intense anxiety some people feel in social situations. They builton previous findings which said that gut microbiome – a collection of bacteria and other organisms living in our gastrointestinal system – of people with social phobia differs from those who do not.

In the latest study, scientists transplanted microbes from the guts of people with SAD into mice and they observed heightened sensitivity to social fear as well as changes in immunity and in the brain.

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John Cryan, a professor at the University College Cork in Ireland and co-author of the study, said while a person’s genetics, environment and other factors can also play a role in disorders like SAD, the latest study explores the effect of our gut health.

“The main point is we need to look after our microbes, especially throughout development and even in adulthood, to keep the social brain working appropriately,” said Cryan, as quoted by the Guardian.

The researchers in the study wrote how they took faecal samples from six healthy people and six people with SAD following DNA analyses they were able to confirm that there was quite a bit of difference between the samples collected from the two groups.

The researchers then transferred this sample to mice who had received antibiotics to kill their microbiota. Subsequently, they were given a series of tests to check their sociability, social cognition, and stress-coping behaviours.

What did the scientists find?

At the end of the study, researchers found that the mice who received gut microbes from people with SAD had different levels of three bacterial species in their faeces than those who received them from healthy individuals.

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According to the study, mice with SAD faecal microbiota showed little to no changes through most of the tests but did behave differently after the social fear experiment.

Eventually, mice with gut microbes from healthy people regained their curiosity towards other mice but those with microbes from people with SAD continued to be scared of approaching others.

Scientists also noted certain changes in the levels of hormones and immune systems between the two groups of mice. The researchers concluded that the “microbiota can play a causal role in heightened social fear responses in the disorder.”

Cryan, as per the Guardian said the findings can be used to develop therapeutics for people with SAD including changes in diet to alter the microbiome. “Increasing the amount of fibres and fermented foods in the diet may have beneficial effects,” said the co-author.

(With inputs from agencies)