Zayn Malik feels people have a new found "respect" for him after he opened up about his anxiety struggles.

The 'Pillowtalk' hitmaker has publicly battled with anxiety over the recent months and he believes talking about the issue has helped others grow a mutual respect for him and his feelings.

He said: "My fans are always supportive of anything I did. They're amazing people and they're always behind me. But the crazy thing for me was, the thing people that I didn't expect to speak to me about that spoke to me about it, random people, like older people that had read the book, and they were like 'I really respect you speaking about that, it takes a lot of strength and a lot of confidence in yourself to be able to just be like 'this is what it is, this is how it was, this is how I'm feeling,' and that was really cool to get that reaction because I didn't necessarily do it for that reason. I just did it because I felt like I needed to do it. So when you get a nice reaction in return it's like a bonus, it's a cool feeling."

And the 24-year-old singer is glad his admission has had a "positive impact" and allowed others to see where his feelings came from.

He added to Us Weekly magazine: "I feel like it was only a positive impact on everything that happened after it and people now have a better perspective on where I was coming from at the time and just an understanding that it wasn't coming from necessarily being ungrateful, shall we say, or not aware of the opportunities that were in front of me, it was just me struggling with being able to actually be there.

"I'm definitely glad I got that off my chest, as anybody is when you feel like you're keeping something from someone you have to speak about it and clear up the air."