Ambiguity potentiates effects of loneliness on feelings of rejection

ABSTRACT

For social species, having strong and high-quality social relationships is an important safety cue. Loneliness occurs when an individual perceives they have insufficient relationships resulting in feelings of lack of safety. States of perceived unsafety are linked to an increased tendency to construe ambiguous information – information lacking a unique clear interpretation – as threatening. Here, we explore whether the ambiguity of social cues of interpersonal rejection moderates effects of loneliness on feelings of rejection while undergoing social exclusion. Data were collected in 2021; 144 adults completed a progressive social exclusion paradigm where they were randomly assigned to be equally included, excluded, or over-included. Social exclusion/inclusion cues became more pronounced over the course of multiple rounds of a ball-tossing game (Cyberball) resulting in a scenario where ambiguity was highest in earlier rounds and decreased over time. Participants reported feelings of loneliness prior to the task and feelings of rejection throughout the task. Results demonstrated that higher loneliness predicted increased feelings of rejection regardless of exclusion condition. Notably, this positive relationship was strongest during earlier rounds when social cues were most ambiguous. These findings contribute to our understanding of how loneliness modulates social perception to enable organisms to adequately adapt to changing circumstances.

KEYWORDS:

• Loneliness
• ambiguity
• rejection
• threat
• social exclusion

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Kyoung Whan Choe for his help and tutorial on embedding jsPsych tasks into Qualtrics.

CRediT author statement

Anita Restrepo: Conceptualisation, Methodology, Software, Formal Analysis, Data Curation, Writing – Original Draft, Visualisation, Funding Acquisition. Karen E. Smith: Methodology, Writing – Review & Editing, Supervision. Emily M. Silver: Writing – Review & Editing. Greg J. Norman: Conceptualisation, Resources, Writing – Original Draft, Supervision, Funding Acquisition.

Data availability

The experiment reported in this article was not formally preregistered. Data, code, and online supplemental materials are available on OSF at https://osf.io/5ty3j/?view_only=7d2e400737db40a2b51ea69b6f869788 and a preprint is available at https://psyarxiv.com/8ferz.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics approval

The experiment reported was approved by the University of Chicago SBS IRB (#IRB21-1111).

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all participants.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the University of Chicago’s Social Sciences Division First Year Scholars Program, which was awarded to the first author (AR).