 Hey Psych2Go family. Before we start, we want to thank you for supporting us. Psych2Go's mission is to help everyone learn more about psychology and mental health in a digestible way. Now, let's begin. Personality is a way of behaving, thinking, and feeling that makes you different from the people around you. Therefore, a personality disorder is when your behavior significantly deviates from cultural expectations, is inflexible, and causes you to stress and problems in other areas of your life. In this video, we'll be focusing on avoidant personality disorder, which is also known as APD. This disorder describes someone who constantly feels inadequate, is hypersensitive to criticism, and avoids social interactions. Before we begin, we would like to mention that this video is created for educational purposes only and is not intended to substitute a professional diagnosis. If you suspect you or someone else may have avoidant personality disorder or any mental health condition, we highly advise you to seek help from a qualified mental health professional. So what is avoidant personality disorder? In the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, avoidant personality disorder is characterized by patterns of social withdrawal, inadequacy, and fear of criticism. A person with APD may completely avoid socializing with others or only socialize if they know that the people there like them. This is because of their fear of rejection. For example, they may purposely avoid group meetings with their co-workers because of their fear of being judged and criticized. They want to ensure that there is no possible way that they'll ever experience something negative from others. Furthermore, they may be scared of intimate relationships with others as well. You're probably wondering, what causes a person to fear rejection so much to the point where they withdraw from social contact and avoid intimate relationships? Well, another critical aspect of avoidant personality disorder is inadequacy. This can be described as feelings of low self-esteem. They may doubt themselves constantly, especially in social situations, and see themselves as inferior to others. These feelings of inadequacy may be so extreme to the point that they completely withdraw themselves from intimate relationships and social situations. Social withdrawal. Due to their fear of criticism and feelings of inadequacy, people with an avoidant personality disorder may withdraw completely from social situations. Their social withdrawal allows them to lessen their fear of rejection as well as to avoid situations where they feel worse about their inadequacy. Someone with APD may seem instead to only be shy, timid, or lonely. It's important to distinguish having these traits versus having this personality disorder. This is why it's especially important you remember that determining whether a person meets the criteria is the responsibility of a mental health professional. You should not try to diagnose yourself or someone else. Did you find this video insightful? What other personality disorders would you like to learn more from us? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below. We hope this video helped shed some light on avoidant personality disorder. If you found this video helpful, be sure to like and share this video with those who might benefit from it. Don't forget to subscribe to Psych2Go for more psychology content. If you want to support Psych2Go, check out our Patreon. The link is in the description below. Thanks for watching, and we'll see you in our next video.