Monitor on Psychology - April 2012 - (Page 51)

As far as the brain is concerned, a broken heart may not be so different from a broken arm. BY KI RSTEN W EI R A nyone who lived through high school gym class knows the anxiety of being picked last for the dodgeball team. The same hurt feelings bubble up when you are excluded from lunch with co-workers, fail to land the job you interviewed for or are dumped by a romantic partner. Rejection feels lousy. Yet for many years, few psychologists tuned into the importance of rejection. “It’s like the whole field missed this centrally important part of human life,” says Mark Leary, PhD, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University. That’s changed over the last decade and a half, as a growing number of researchers have turned their eyes toward this uncomfortable fact of life. “People have realized just how much our concern with social acceptance spreads its fingers into almost everything we do,” he says. As researchers have dug deeper into the roots of rejection, they’ve found surprising evidence that the pain of being excluded is not so different from the pain of physical injury. Rejection also has serious implications for an individual’s psychological state and for society in general. Social rejection can influence emotion, cognition and even physical health. Ostracized people sometimes become aggressive and can turn to violence. In 2003 Leary and colleagues analyzed 15 cases of school shooters, and found all but two suffered from social rejection (Aggressive Behavior, 2003). Clearly, there are good reasons to better understand the effects of being excluded. “Humans have a fundamental need to belong. Just as we have needs for food and water, we also have needs for positive and lasting relationships,” says C. Nathan DeWall, PhD, a psychologist at the University of Kentucky. “This need is deeply rooted in our evolutionary history and has all sorts of consequences for modern psychological processes.” Pain in the brain As clever as human beings are, we rely on social groups for survival. We evolved to live in cooperative societies, and for most of human history we depended on those groups for our lives. Like hunger or thirst, our need for acceptance emerged as a mechanism for survival. “A solitary human being could not have survived during the six million years of human evolution while we were living out there on the African savannah,” Leary says. With today’s modern conveniences, a person can physically survive a solitary existence. But that existence is probably not a happy one. Thanks to millions of years of natural selection, being rejected is still painful. That’s not just a metaphor. Naomi Eisenberger, PhD, at the University of California, Los Angeles, Kipling Williams, PhD, at Purdue University, and colleagues 51 APRIL 2012 • MONITOR ON PSYCHOLOGY

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Monitor on Psychology - April 2012

Monitor on Psychology - April 2010
Letters
President’s Column
Contents
From the CEO
Internship Shortage Continues
Mental Health Services Remain Scarce at Community Colleges
Apa Weighs in on the Constitutionality of Life Without Parole for Juvenile Offenders
Apa Praises Court’s Support for Equality
New Mobile App Answers Psychologists’ Clinical Questions
Nih Offers Free Web Resources for Psychologist Researchers
New and Improved Psyclink
In Brief
Government Relations Update
Time Capsule
Questionnaire
Random Sample
Judicial Notebook
Early Career Psychology
Psychologist Profile
Coal Miners’ Dilemma
The Science of Political Advertising
Science Watch
Science Directions
More Support Needed for Trauma Interventions
The Case Against Spanking
Innovative Psychology at the High School Level
Speaking of Education
Apa Divisions Reach Out to New Psychologists
New Journal Editors
A Home Base for Multiple Fields
Division Spotlight
American Psychological Foundation
Awards and Funding Opportunities
Personalities

Monitor on Psychology - April 2012