Social exclusion is universally practiced and universally painful. Ostracism or rejection by important relationship partners is almost always psychologically damaging. Research in psychology has shown that social exclusion changes the ways that people think about their social worlds, sensitizing them to relevant types of social information. Although social exclusion (unsurprisingly) makes people feel sad or hurt, a surprising finding from a number of studies is that social exclusion often leads to increased anger and aggression and that such aggression can even be directed towards individuals who did not do the excluding. The present research project builds on these findings and generates novel hypotheses by integrating a social psychological perspective on social exclusion with theories of sociality coming from evolutionary psychology. Specifically, this research applies the evolutionary psychological idea of hidden correlations. Hidden correlations are relationships that cannot necessarily be detected during one's own lifetime, but that can be detected by natural selection over deep time. These hidden correlations can drive the evolution of psychological processes, creating minds that expect certain correlations to exist, even if an individual would be otherwise unable to learn of them through experience. The proposed research therefore focuses on the hidden correlates of social exclusion.
Based on this, the present research, conducted by researchers Leda Cosmides and John Tooby at the Center for Evolutionary Psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, examines four related sets of hypotheses. The first study set examines the hidden correlates of different reasons for exclusion: Do different causes of exclusion lead to distinct responses? The second study set examines the hidden correlations between social exclusion and social devaluation (the extent to which others take - or fail to take - one's interests and welfare into account). This study set investigates how hidden correlates of social exclusion lead to antisocial reactions, such as aggression, as a means of 'bargaining' for better treatment. The third study set examines a surprising set of predictions made by thinking in terms of hidden correlations: Social exclusion will sensitize the mind to threats of predation, starvation, and illness and injury - all threats faced by excluded individuals in ancestral, but not necessarily modern, environments. Finally, across all study sets, the proposed research examines the biological mediators of the effects of social exclusion by measuring hormonal indicators of stress.
Social exclusion is universally practiced and universally painful—ostracism or rejection by important relationship partners is almost always psychologically damaging. A burgeoning social psychological literature on social exclusion has revealed two important findings: First, social exclusion redirects a number of cognitive and emotional processes, such as sensitizing individuals to specific and relevant types of social information. Second, social exclusion often leads to increased anger and aggression, even toward third-parties. This project built on these findings and generated novel hypotheses by integrating a social psychological perspective on social exclusion with theories of sociality coming from evolutionary psychology. Specifically, this research applied the evolutionary psychological idea of hidden correlations. Hidden correlations are relationships that cannot necessarily be detected during one’s own lifetime, but that can be detected by natural selection over deep time. These hidden correlations can drive the evolution of psychological processes, creating minds that expect certain correlations to exist—even if an individual would be otherwise unable to learn of them through experience. This research therefore focuses on the hidden correlates of social exclusion. Based on this, the present research examined four related sets of hypotheses. The first study set examined the hidden correlates of different reasons for exclusion: Do different causes of exclusion lead to distinct, cause-specific responses? Our results showed that indeed they may—people respond differently depending on whether they are excluded for exploiting others versus being unable to contribute. These results have implications for understanding how work groups function in businesses (e.g. how do employees react when excluded from core activities, based on the reason for exclusion?). The second study set examines the hidden correlations between social exclusion and social devaluation (the extent to which others take—or fail to take—one’s interests and welfare into account). This study set investigates how hidden correlates of social exclusion lead to antisocial reactions, such as aggression. Real-world data often finds a link between social isolation and aggression (e.g., school shootings). Despite expectations, a laboratory analogue found no consistent effects: mild, short-term exclusion did not reliably lead to greater aggression on a low-stakes laboratory task. This result questions the utility of using laboratory analogues to understand real-world, high stakes aggression. The third study set examined a surprising set of predictions made by thinking in terms of hidden correlations: Social exclusion will sensitize the mind to threats of predation, starvation, and illness & injury—all threats faced by excluded individuals in ancestral, but not necessarily modern, environments. The pattern of results was complex, but showed that in many cases exclusion did sensitize people to these threats. To the extent that social exclusion leads to anxiety about these types of threats, it could lead to increases in symptoms associated with (e.g.) agoraphobia or obsessive-compulsive disorder. Major Results The major goal of this project is to examine the hidden correlates of social exclusion. That is, we are interested in understanding current findings and making new discoveries about social exclusion by considering it in both its ancestral and current contexts. Study Set 1 examined the hidden correlations of different types of social exclusion. Do responses to exclusion and attempts to reconnect with others systematically vary, depending on the reason for exclusion? Using laboratory manipulations, Study 1A examined whether there are distinct emotional and behavioral responses to being excluded for free riding versus being unable to contribute to a group effort. In particular, this study tested the hypothesis that people excluded for free riding react with shame and guilt, while those excluded for inability react with anger. Study 1B replicated the previous study and incorporated physiological measures to assess potential biological mediators (cortisol). In both studies, participants also described tactics they would use to rejoin their groups. Study Set 2 focused on the hidden correlations connecting social exclusion and aggression. Exclusion may be a cue that others—including third-parties—will no longer value the excluded person’s welfare. Study 2A directly tested whether excluded people expect others—both excluders and third-parties—to devalue their welfare. Based on the hypothesis that aggression was ancestrally useful for enforcing one’s interests (even though it is often maladaptive in modern environments), Study 2B-D tested whether excluded people are aggressive to third-parties only in the presence of ancestral cues that aggression would be an effective interpersonal tactic. Study Set 3 focused on the hidden correlations between ancestral dangers and social exclusion. In ancestral environments, excluded people were more vulnerable to many threats. Using social cognitive measures, Study Set 3 tested whether excluded people are more sensitive to the risk of predation (Study 3A-B), starvation (Study 3C), and illness/injury (Study 3D).
