Adding injury to insult: unexpected rejection leads to more aggressive responses.
Previous research indicates that rejection by a group causes aggressive responses. However, in these previous studies, rejected participants were led to believe that they were liked and accepted before the rejection; likely, this rejection was highly unanticipated. Sociometer theory (Leary et al., 1995) proposes the existence of a psychological mechanism (a "sociometer") that enables individuals to detect potential rejection via others' reactions; a properly working sociometer affords a person predictive control over an interaction. We hypothesized the lack of predictive control inherent in previous rejection studies was a critical contributor to participants' aggressive responses; predictive control should lead to decreased aggression. To test this, we manipulated predictive control by varying confederate behavior toward participants before a rejection manipulation. Results indicate that unpredictable rejection undermined participants' belief that they could predict other's behavior (i.e., led to the perception of a broken sociometer) and led to higher levels of aggression.
Department of Psychological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907, USA. edwesse@psych.purdue.edu
Eric D
ED
Wesselmann
Fionnuala A
FA
Butler
Kipling D
KD
Williams
Cynthia L
CL
Pickett
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000374:Aggression / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D012016:Reference Values; D012059:Rejection, Psychology; D012649:Self Concept; D012718:Set, Psychology; D012928:Social Desirability; D012938:Social Perception