Rejection from the Group

The species Homo sapiens has a strong dependence on group living. A solitary human, compared with many of the animals of Africa—the continent where our species evolved over millions of years—possessed neither thick skin, nor long and sharp teeth, nor powerful claws, nor strong muscles. Instead, humans survived and increased their chances of reproduction by benefiting from the advantages of living in groups.

The brain of any animal that lives in a group must possess characteristics that motivate it to remain within that group. The desire of Homo sapiens to remain in a group must have been so strong that individuals would not easily separate from the group because of every minor event, make plans to live alone, or put such plans into action. Doing so would not only reduce their chances of survival, but would very likely minimize their chances of mating and passing their genes on to future generations.

In other words, those whose brains generated a stronger desire for group living, remaining connected, and maintaining relationships with group members had a greater chance of survival and of passing their genetic information to the next generation. Therefore, it is not surprising to find mechanisms in the human brain that create a desire to remain within a group and maintain relationships with its members, or that, when a person is rejected from the group, produce feelings of pain, suffering, and distress, compelling the individual to attempt to rejoin the group in order to escape those unpleasant feelings.

Numerous experiments have been designed and conducted to examine the effects of ostracism on the human brain. In these experiments, participants are not told that researchers intend to study the effects of rejection on them. Instead, a different purpose is presented so that they do not realize they are going to experience feelings of exclusion.

One such experiment is the Cyberball test. Participants are told that they are going to play a computer game with two other players located in different rooms. In the game, they pass a ball to one another while researchers measure different aspects of their brain activity. The experiment begins, and after several rounds of passing, the other two players ignore the participant, stop passing the ball to them, and continue passing only between themselves.

Kipling D. Williams, a psychologist from Purdue University, examined more than 5,000 people using this type of experiment and studied the effects of ostracism on them.

The findings of such studies showed that when a person is rejected, two brain regions—the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and the anterior insula (AI)—show increased activity. These are the same regions that become more active during physical pain.

Of course, in physical pain, other areas of the brain that indicate the location of the pain, including regions such as the primary and secondary somatosensory cortices (S1 and S2) and the posterior insula, are also activated. These regions are not activated during experiences of social rejection. It can therefore be said that during ostracism, we experience a form of pain that has no specific physical location.

Williams concluded from his experiments and studies that the pain of rejection is deeper and lasts longer than physical pain.

Williams’ observations showed him that even brief rejection by a stranger—someone whom we do not know and may never have even seen before—can lead to intense, harmful, and long-lasting reactions. He observed these reactions across a wide range of people with different personalities.

He found that after the initial painful effects and the strong reactions they first displayed, individuals entered a second stage: attempting to find a way back into the group. They might become stricter and more conservative in following the customs and traditions of society and, increasingly unconsciously, try to conform themselves to socially accepted behaviors.

For some time after being rejected, even without being aware of it, they imitate the simplest movements of those around them, such as unconscious movements of their legs or facial expressions. This suggests that such imitative behavior may originate not from the conscious parts of the brain, but from unconscious systems such as the limbic system. [1]

Ostracism-related behaviors are not found only in humans. They are also observed in many higher animals, such as mammals and birds; however, such behaviors have not been observed in reptiles².

Up to this point, based on what has been discussed, we can infer that the emotions and feelings generated by ostracism are likely rooted in our limbic system.

Ostracism can undermine a person’s self-confidence and sense of control over their circumstances, make them more aggressive, and increase harmful behaviors, particularly self-harming behaviors. A rejected person may no longer enjoy pleasurable activities such as parties and travel and becomes more vulnerable to depression. They may fail to take advantage of opportunities for success and lose them.

The regions DACC and AI contain a high density of opioid receptors, or receptors sensitive to morphine, and a rejected person may therefore have a greater tendency than usual to use drugs in an attempt to overcome the pain of ostracism. In other words, for example, a rejected person who is already addicted may experience a stronger desire for opioid substances such as morphine and heroin.

It can be said that all of us experience rejection by others at some point in our lives and become familiar with its pain. As a result, we are careful in our behavior to avoid actions that could lead to a repetition of that experience. This concern, caution, and sensitivity toward rejection prevents us from doing many things and saying many things that may come to our minds.

We can therefore expect that fear of the pain of rejection causes the older parts of the brain to regulate the activity of the cerebral cortex.

Religious faith is instilled in us and taught to us by another person or other people, and after adopting the same faith as theirs, we experience a stronger sense of connection with them. Now we and they all believe in the same story. This story is usually not merely a simple narrative; it is a worldview.

An entire family or group may believe in the same supernatural being or beings, share the same story about the creation of the world, and regard the same set of laws, rules, commandments, and moral principles as governing their lives.

This makes it much easier for us to cooperate, interact, and form friendships with another member of our family or group when we know that they think like us, that what they consider good and moral is the same as what we consider good and moral, and that what they consider bad and immoral is the same as what we consider bad and immoral.

In this way, we intuitively realize that if we too turn away from the beliefs shared by our group members, they will develop a different attitude toward us, and it is likely that they will at least reject us—and perhaps the consequences will be even worse.

It is possible that the desire to remain within the group and the fear of rejection may, from the very beginning, cause the limbic system to regulate the activity of the cerebral cortex in such a way that it prevents us from engaging in any intellectual effort to critically examine the beliefs we share with our fellow group members.

In any case, our older brain systems have shown that when they recognize that the outcome of one of our activities could be dangerous or painful for us, or when they recognize that an action could be pleasurable, they can regulate the activity of the cerebral cortex in such a way that we use it to produce all the necessary justifications for avoiding danger, pain, and suffering, or for achieving pleasure.

For example, we may have made a firm decision to follow a diet under all circumstances, based on logical reasons and for the sake of protecting our health. Yet, as soon as we encounter an appealing, colorful, and fragrant food, we abandon all that careful logic and foresight. Using that same rational cerebral cortex, we resort to whatever arguments are available to convince ourselves that we should postpone the diet until tomorrow or next week. We prove to ourselves that eating that food will not cause much harm and that no real problem will occur. We may even admire our own wisdom and intelligence for coming up with those supposedly rational arguments.

Likewise, although we may consider ourselves highly committed to morality and have a good understanding of right and wrong, when our interests or potential losses and gains become involved, we justify ourselves in any way possible and with any reasoning available. We convince ourselves that our method of achieving benefits or avoiding losses is completely ethical. We may even take pride in how sophisticated and subtle our arguments appear, while only yesterday, if another person had chosen the same approach, we would have openly considered it immoral.

In one study, each participant was told that at the end of each experiment they could choose which of two gifts they wanted to keep and which one they wanted to give to another participant whom they could not see. One of the gifts was a lottery ticket, and the other was a pass to attend an uninteresting and boring lecture.

Most participants chose the lottery ticket for themselves. The researchers then asked those who had taken the ticket: “Do you think what you did was ethical or not?” Ninety-five percent acknowledged that their action had been unethical and selfish. On average, they rated themselves 4.38 out of 9 in terms of having a moral character.

A second group underwent the same test, but this time they were asked to determine the distribution of the prizes by flipping a coin. Ninety percent of participants succeeded, through the coin toss, in assigning the better prize to themselves. This statistic means that many of them cheated; otherwise, approximately 50% should have received the better prize.

However, what is interesting is that when this group was asked whether they thought their action was ethical, 80% said that they had behaved ethically. This time, on average, they rated themselves 8.3 out of 9 in terms of moral character.

In reality, they cheated in a way that allowed the outcome of the coin toss to be the one they desired while also convincing themselves that, after all, it was the coin toss that had determined the result.

It appears that when our interests, benefits, or losses are involved, our older brain systems can cause the cerebral cortex to find deceptive methods and hypocritical justifications for achieving its desires, in such a way that the person themselves may not clearly realize that they have acted unfairly or reasoned unfairly.

It can therefore be expected that fear of a major source of suffering, such as rejection from the group, may cause us to become increasingly persistent and biased in favor of our religious beliefs, and lead us to continually construct arguments that make our beliefs align with those of our group.