Attentional control moderates the relationship between social anxiety symptoms and attentional disengagement from threatening information

•We assessed the link between social anxiety and threat engagement and disengagement.•We examined whether attentional control (AC) moderated those relationships.•Increased social anxiety related to slower threat disengagement at low levels of AC.•Increased social anxiety related to faster threat disengagement at high levels of AC.•AC may be an important process underlying variability in attentional bias in anxiety.