Are socially anxious people less likable than others?

Usually not. In one study of 631 adolescents, anxious participants rated their own likability lower, but peers liked them just as much. Other research finds small real differences in how conversation partners rate anxious speakers, so the picture is mixed rather than clear.

What is the fastest way to seem more likable if you have social anxiety?

Share something personal. A recent study found that simply sharing personal experiences increased likability for socially anxious people, regardless of their anxiety levels. One small, true sentence about yourself does more than staying quiet to avoid mistakes.

Why do anxious people sometimes get lower ratings in conversations?

Partly because of reduced joint action, the back-and-forth coordination of conversation. A 2020 study found less joint action in conversations with highly anxious participants, and that statistically explained lower ratings for impression, interaction quality, and desire to meet again.

Can relaxation help me speak Dutch more easily?

Relaxation does not teach vocabulary, but it reduces self-focused attention, which is what narrows your ability to listen and respond. Calming your breathing before a conversation makes it easier to attempt one personal sentence and one follow-up question.

How Can Socially Anxious People Become More Likable?

Q: Does the other person's personality affect how likable I seem?

Yes. A 2026 study found that evaluator characteristics, including their own social anxiety and need for affiliation, significantly influenced how they rated socially anxious speakers. A lukewarm reaction may reflect the listener's preferences as much as your behaviour.

Socially anxious people are usually more likable than they believe. Research shows peers rate them just as highly as others, and that sharing personal experiences and staying engaged in conversation raises likability further. The gap is mostly in self-perception, not in how others actually see you.

Key takeaways

Socially anxious people often rate their own likability lower than their peers do, while peers like them just as much (Klein et al., 2018).
Sharing personal stories increases likability for socially anxious people, regardless of their anxiety level (PsyPost summary of new research).
Less back-and-forth engagement (called joint action) partly explains why anxious speakers sometimes get lower ratings (Günak et al., 2020).
The listener matters too: their own personality and need for affiliation shape how they rate an anxious speaker (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026).

Are socially anxious people actually less likable?

Mostly no. The evidence points to a perception gap rather than a real likability gap.

In a study of 631 adolescents, those with higher social anxiety rated their own likability significantly lower than their less anxious peers did. But their peers liked them equally. The anxious group was not less liked, they just believed they were (Klein et al., 2018). That finding matters because it separates the feeling of being judged from the fact of being judged.

Other work is more mixed. In filmed conversations, partners rated highly socially anxious participants less positively than low-anxiety participants, and rated the interaction quality lower too (Günak et al., 2020). A newer quasi-experimental study found that likability ratings depended partly on the evaluator, including their own social anxiety and need for affiliation (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026). So the honest answer is: sometimes there is a small real difference, often there is not, and your own estimate of it is usually too harsh.

What actually increases likability for anxious people?

Sharing something personal about yourself is the most direct lever the research supports.

A recent study found that simply sharing personal experiences boosted how likable socially anxious people seemed to others, and this held regardless of anxiety levels (PsyPost). This fits a broader pattern: anxious people often hold back to avoid saying the wrong thing, and that holding back is exactly what makes them harder to connect with. Self-disclosure is also one of the variables examined in the 2026 likability study, alongside first impressions (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026).

The practical version: say one true thing about yourself per conversation. Not a confession, not a performance. A small fact, a preference, a recent annoyance. That is the behaviour the data points to.

Why does staying engaged matter more than being smooth?

Because conversation is a two-person process, and anxious speakers often quietly opt out of it.

The 2020 study measured what researchers call joint action: the back-and-forth coordination between two people talking. Conversations with highly anxious participants showed less joint action, and that reduced joint action statistically explained the lower ratings for general impression, interaction quality, and desire to meet again (Günak et al., 2020).

You do not need to be witty. You need to keep the ball moving: ask a follow-up, react to what they said, add your own angle. Silence and self-monitoring break the rhythm, and the other person reads the break, not your inner panic.

Does the other person's personality change how likable you seem?

Yes, and this is one of the more useful findings for anyone who replays conversations afterwards.

The 2026 study found that evaluator characteristics, including their own social anxiety and their need for affiliation, significantly influenced how they rated socially anxious speakers (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026). In plain terms: a flat reaction may say more about the listener than about you. Someone who needs a lot of social warmth will rate a reserved speaker lower. Someone who is also anxious may read your reserve as familiar rather than cold.

This is not a reason to stop trying. It is a reason to stop treating one lukewarm conversation as a verdict on your personality.

What can you say in Dutch to practise this?

These phrases are short, low-risk, and built for exactly the behaviours above: small self-disclosure and keeping the exchange going.

Ik vond het best spannend om hier te komen.: I found it quite nerve-racking to come here.
Ik ben nog niet zo lang in Nederland.: I have not been in the Netherlands very long yet.
Wat bedoel je precies?: What exactly do you mean?
Vertel eens, hoe was jouw week?: Tell me, how was your week?
Ik hou meer van rustige avonden dan van grote feesten.: I prefer quiet evenings to big parties.
Sorry, ik ben even kwijt wat ik wilde zeggen.: Sorry, I have lost track of what I wanted to say.

Notice that several of these are disclosures, not questions. That is deliberate. Questions alone keep you hidden.

"I always assumed people found me awkward. Then a colleague said she thought I was calm and easy to talk to. I had spent the whole evening convinced I was failing."

What should you do before a conversation you are dreading?

Lower your arousal first, then aim for one small disclosure and one follow-up question.

Breathing slowly and relaxing before you speak does not change who you are, but it makes the engaged behaviour above easier to actually perform. Anxiety narrows attention onto yourself, and self-focused attention is what produces the reduced joint action seen in the research (Günak et al., 2020). A calmer body gives you back the bandwidth to listen and respond.

Set a target you control: one personal sentence, one follow-up. Not "make them like me", which you cannot control, and which the 2026 study suggests depends partly on them anyway (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026).

Is the evidence strong enough to trust?

It is promising but not settled, and it is worth saying so plainly.

The self-versus-peer likability finding comes from a specific group, adolescents with mild to borderline intellectual disabilities, so it may not transfer cleanly to every adult population (Klein et al., 2018). The joint action study had 36 highly anxious and 36 low-anxious participants, a modest sample (Günak et al., 2020). The 2026 study is recent and its design is quasi-experimental rather than a randomised trial (Niță and Rotărescu, 2026). The self-disclosure finding is reported in research coverage rather than a long-standing body of replication (PsyPost).

What the sources agree on is modest and usable: anxious people underestimate how much they are liked, holding back hurts more than saying the slightly wrong thing, and the listener is part of the equation.

If you want to rehearse the calm-before-speaking part rather than just read about it, HypnoDutch's free first week practises exactly this, with breathing and relaxation before the Dutch practice starts. You can try it at hypnodutch.com/course.