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One of the most popular measures of social anxiety is the Liebowitz Social Anxiety scale (LSAS). Recently, the LSAS has been converted into a self-reported format (LSAS-SR). Yao et al. (1999) has adapted the LSAS and LSAS-SR into French. They reported no difference between both versions. However, Yao et al. (1999) did not assess the score reliability and structural validity of the scale. In addition, no study to date has examined the test-retest reliability of the French version LSAS-SR. The present study was designed to overcome these limitations. In a first sample, 428 French speaking volunteers (292 women) were administered the French version of the LSAS-SR. In a second sample, 114 participants were administered the LSAS-SR twice over an 8-week period. Confirmatory factor analyses establish the structural validity of the French version of the LSAS-SR. Good psychometric properties, including test-retest reliability, are also observed.

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Models of anxiety disorders posit that information processing biases towards threat may result from an imbalance between top-down attentional control processes and bottom-up attentional processes, such that anxiety could reduce the influence of the former and increase the influence of the latter. However, researchers have recently pointed to limitations of the top-down/bottom-up terminology and outlined the additional contribution of memory processes to attention guidance. The goal of this paper is to provide bridges between recent findings from cognitive psychology and anxiety disorders research. We first provide an integrative overview of the processes influencing the content of working memory, including the availability of attentional control, and the strengths of task goals, stimulus salience, selection history and long-term memory. We then illustrate the interest of this formulation to the study of information processing biases in anxiety disorders, with a specific focus on social anxiety.

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Models of social anxiety (SA) place the self as an organizing and causal center involved in the maintenance of this condition. An integrative conceptual framework for the understanding of the self is used to review the literature on the self in SA. Two main distinctions are emphasized: the self‐as‐a‐subject (I‐self) versus self‐as‐an‐object (Me‐self), and the evolutionary‐based distinction of social rank versus affiliation. We argue that (a) although much progress has been made in understanding the association between SA and Me‐self, the association between SA and I‐self remains largely unexplored (with the important exception of anxiety‐related processes in social situations); and (b) experiences and representations of the self in SA center on social rank. We suggest that in SA, social rank themes constitute the linchpins of identity, defined as the content and structure of the Me‐self. We speculate that processes related to low social rank contribute to the focus on representational (Me), rather than experiential (I), self‐aspects. Finally, we delineate the ways in which such an understanding may direct and refine the construction of novel, individually tailored, therapeutic approaches.