What is the Difference Between Shy and Timid

The main difference between shy and timid is that someone who is shy looks forward to interacting with others even though they know it is difficult whereas someone who is timid does not necessarily look forward to any novelty in their lives.

We encounter varied different people with varied personality traits in life. While some are straightforward and extrovert, there are some who are shy, timid, and even introvert. Moreover, shy and timid are two psychological issues among us.  At a glance, these traits overlap due to their similar nature, but there is a distinct difference between shy and timid.

Key Areas Covered

1. What Does Shy Mean
     – Definition, Characteristics 
2. What Does Timid Mean
     – Definition, Characteristics 
3. What are the Similarities Between Shy and Timid
     – Outline of Common Features
4. What is the Difference Between Shy and Timid
     – Comparison of Key Differences

Key Terms

Psychology, Personality, Shy, Timid

What Does Shy Mean

Shy is when someone is very nervous or anxious and lacks the confidence in themselves to confront others. As a result, shy people tend to get easily affected by their immense anxiety and become helpless not knowing how to overcome this anxiety and interact with others even though they really want to interact and connect with others.

As a consequence, a shy person eventually avoids social situations since it makes them utterly uncomfortable and ends up feeling awkward not being able to move on with others. Therefore, shyness is often associated with those who have low self-esteem. Shy people often find it extremely difficult facing new situations or interacting with unfamiliar people.

The main psychological fact with shy people is their under-estimating attitude or low self-confidence, which trigger them to culminate an ego-driven fear of what other people will think of a person’s behaviour. 

Furthermore, there is a growing hypothesis among scientists that shyness is at least partially genetic in addition to environmental factors. The environmental or surrounding responsible factors might include situations such as being subjected to physical abuse and emotional abuse such as humiliation and ridicule.

Overcoming shyness is indeed a challenge, and most often shy people need the assistance of some trustworthy party such as parents and school teachers to overcome this. Moreover, there are also social skills development workshops at the school levels where the teachers can question and talk with shy students in a less direct and intimidating manner in order to gently encourage them to speak up in class and make friends with other children.

What Does Timid Mean

Timid is defined as showing a lack of courage or confidence and also easily frightened. As a result, if someone is timid, they are easily frightened and scared by anything, even by things that are not scary at all. Therefore, it is easy to assume that someone who is shy is timid at the same time. However, it is not the case, someone who is shy only lacks the confidence to move on with others due to being nervous while someone who is timid is very scared and frightened of anything. Nevertheless, timidity can be identified as an extreme form of shyness according to psychology.

Thus, being timid can last longer, and it is hard to overcome. As a result, timid is a negative trait, therefore, someone who is timid doesn’t anticipate novelties in their life; instead, they fear novelties in life. Similarly, someone who is timid is extremely frightened, thus does not want to interact with others, unlike a shy person who needs to interact though it is quite difficult for them.

Moreover, according to psychology, social anxiety and social phobia are related with timidness. Similarly, there are varied underlying psychological issues for someone to be timid, such as being a victim of abuse, bullying, etc.

Similarities Between Shy and Timid

• Shy and timid are associated with social anxiety issues.
• Timid is an extreme form of shyness, which is, in addition, characterized by being scared as well.
• Also, both shy people and timid people produce a high level of stress hormones. 

Difference Between Shy and Timid

Definition

Shy is when someone lacks the confidence or is unable to cope up with their anxiety to interact with others while timid is essentially characterized by someone being extremely scared of almost everything around. This is the basis of the difference between shy and timid. 

Nervousness

There is an extreme sense of nervousness in someone who is shy, which is quite difficult to overcome, while there is an extreme nervousness in someone who is timid, which results in social phobia. This is an important difference between shy and timid. 

Confidence

Furthermore, another important difference between shy and timid is that shy is essentially characterized by the lack of confidence and low self-esteem while timid is essentially characterized by the quality of being always frightened by novelty along with the lack of self-confidence.

Need for Interaction

Shy people, although they know it is difficult to interact with others, want to interact with others once they are encouraged under a comfortable atmosphere whereas timid people don’t have a need to interact, nor do they have any novelty in their lives since they are always scared of novelties. This we can consider as the main difference between shy and timid. 

Conclusion

We often tend to use the two terms shy and timid interchangeably due to their similar nature. Someone who is shy lacks confidence or do not know how to overcome their anxiety while someone who is timid gets very scared and frightened by almost anything in addition to having low self-confidence. The main difference between shy and timid is that someone who is shy needs to interact with others though it is difficult whereas someone who is timid does not need to interact with others or any novel thing in life.

Reference:

1. “Shyness.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Sept. 2018, Available here.
2. “No Dates for the Timid?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, Available here.
3. “Timid Vs Shy?” Learn English Online, Teach English – World #1, Englishforums.com, 31 Oct. 2016, Available here.

Image Courtesy:

1. “shy girl in glasses” By craig Cloutier (CC BY-SA 2.0) via Flickr
2. “shy” By edward musiak (CC BY-SA 2.0) via Flickr

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