Reward Deficits in Co-Occurring Social Anxiety and Depression: The Roles of Anhedonia, Boredom, Loneliness, and COVID-19 Social Restriction

Authors

• Nathan M. Hager, Old Dominion UniversityFollow
• Alicia L. Milam, Old Dominion UniversityFollow
• Hannah C. Hamrick, Old Dominion University
• Benjamin Swanson, University of Arkansas
• Matt R. Judah, Old Dominion University

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2026

DOI

10.1002/jclp.70204

Publication Title

Journal of Clinical Psychology

Volume

Advance online publication

Pages

1-14

Abstract

Prior research points toward reward deficits as crucial to the link between social anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder. However, studies have not explored specific types of reward deficits or how social-environmental factors may impact them. The current study examined whether the indirect effects of three reward deficits (anhedonia, boredom, and loneliness) accounted for the connection between social anxiety and depression. Questionnaires were collected in a sample of college students (N = 523) during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing examination of environmental stressors (i.e., remote learning and current friend network size) on reward deficits. Indirect effect models showed that anhedonia, boredom, and loneliness each uniquely partly accounted for the association between social anxiety and depression (accounting for 20%, 38%, and 14% of the association, respectively), with boredom accounting for the largest proportion. Further, analyses suggested that anhedonia was associated with the social anxiety-depression link only among remote learners, while loneliness appeared to be only associated among students who had smaller friend networks. Findings highlight the importance of reward deficits in co-occurring social anxiety-depression symptoms. We present novel findings showing the strong role of boredom in the connection between social anxiety and depression symptoms, suggesting a new transdiagnostic treatment target. Social-environmental stressors, such as remote learning and contact with fewer friends, may exacerbate the connection between reward deficits and social anxiety-depression co-occurrence and serve as areas for intervention.

Rights

© 2026 The Authors.

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution‐NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in anymedium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.

Data Availability

Article states: "The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in Reward Deficits in Comorbid Social Anxiety and Depression at https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/MNFE6."

Original Publication Citation

Hager, N. M., Milam, A. L., Hamrick, H. C., Swanson, B., & Judah, M. R. (2026). Reward deficits in co-occurring social anxiety and depression: The roles of anhedonia, boredom, loneliness, and COVID-19 social restriction. Journal of Clinical Psychology, Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.70204

ORCID

0000-0003-2083-7337 (Hager), 0000-0002-7150-5378 (Milam), 0000-0002-8840-8734 (Hamrick), 0000-0003-3825-6821 (Judah)

Repository Citation

Hager, Nathan M.; Milam, Alicia L.; Hamrick, Hannah C.; Swanson, Benjamin; and Judah, Matt R., "Reward Deficits in Co-Occurring Social Anxiety and Depression: The Roles of Anhedonia, Boredom, Loneliness, and COVID-19 Social Restriction" (2026). Psychology Faculty Publications. 261.
https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/psychology_fac_pubs/261