{"id":74847,"date":"2022-08-02T14:35:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-02T18:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=74847"},"modified":"2022-08-10T12:42:05","modified_gmt":"2022-08-10T16:42:05","slug":"benefits-of-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/benefits-of-anxiety\/","title":{"rendered":"Are There Benefits of Anxiety? Ph.D. Answers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Are there benefits of anxiety? Why do some people believe anxiety helps them?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Unwinding Anxiety<\/em>, Dr. Judson Brewer claims that many people object to receiving anxiety treatment because they believe there are benefits to anxiety. However, he disputes these claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Learn why Brewer suggests there are no advantages to anxiety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Why There Are No Benefits of Anxiety<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Brewer says that one of the benefits of treating anxiety as a habit is that doing so allows us to analyze the rewards <\/em>of our anxious behavior<\/strong>. In a habit loop<\/a>, a reward is any result that reinforces the behavior. For example, if you feel anxious and eat some potato chips, you enjoy a salty snack, your body enjoys a dopamine hit as it processes the carbohydrates, and your mind (possibly) enjoys a brief respite from whatever caused the anxiety. This makes people believe that there are benefits of anxiety. These short-term rewards are part of the reason we get addicted to anxiety<\/strong> even though it has numerous long-term consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brewer argues that a key step in breaking the anxiety habit<\/a> is changing the value we place on anxiety\u2019s rewards. He suggests that if we recognize that these short-term benefits aren\u2019t actually that fulfilling, we\u2019ll be less apt to continue thinking and behaving anxiously<\/strong>. Then, if we substitute non-anxious behaviors that offer better rewards, we\u2019ll learn to choose those behaviors over anxious ones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Updating Your Reward Value<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

According to Brewer, the trick to seeing that anxiety is unrewarding is to realize that our brains often overestimate the value of anxiety-related rewards. In other words, he claims that if you pay close enough attention, you\u2019ll notice that potato chips don\u2019t taste that <\/em>good and that generally, the more of them you eat, the less you enjoy them and the worse you feel. The problem is that the brain takes a lot of factors into account when assessing reward value, and some of these factors aren\u2019t directly relevant to the <\/strong>actual<\/em><\/strong> quality of the reward<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, if you enjoy looking at Instagram posts, your brain\u2019s Instagram reward calculation might take into account Instagram\u2019s informational and entertainment values, as you\u2019d expect. But it\u2019s also taking into account:<\/p>\n\n\n\n