title: Clarifying the relationship between ostracism and relational devaluation.
abstract: We examine how three perspectives on relational devaluation relate to needs threat following ostracism. In two experiments with 179 first-year psychology students, distress was greatest when participants were ostracized without any prior throws, and distress decreased linearly with increasing prior inclusion. In Experiment 3, using 76 first-year psychology students, we manipulated expectations of exclusion and found expectations predicted distress following ostracism, suggesting ostracism's distress can be influenced by norm-based expectations of inclusion, and that progressive relational devaluation is not a necessary condition for ostracism's distress.
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Gerber
authors.forename: Ladd
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Wheeler
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D012929:Psychological Distance; D012059:Rejection, Psychology; D012649:Self Concept; D012934:Social Isolation / Q000523:psychology*; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology; D055815:Young Adult