Social Ostracism by Coworkers: Does Rejection Lead to Loafing or Compensation?

Abstract

A new theoretical model and research paradigm are introduced to investigate the phenomenon of social ostracism-being ignored by others who are in one's presence. The authors examined the effects of social ostracism on individuals' subsequent contributions to a group task. Social loafing Optically occurs on collective tasks. However; to regain their sense of belonging to the group, the authors expected ostracized individuals to socially compensate-to work harder collectively than coactively. Participants were asked to generate as many uses as they could for an object, either coactively or collectively with two others who had either ostracized or included them in an earlier ball-tossing exchange. Ostracized females socially compensated, whereas nonostracized females neither loafed nor compensated. Ostracized and nonostracized males socially loafed. Based on these data and the accompanying attributional and nonverbal analyses, the authors surmised that males and females interpret and respond to social ostracism differently.

Social Exclusion and the Deconstructed State: Time Perception, Meaninglessness, Lethargy, Lack of Emotion, and Self-Awareness.

“…These results are consistent with those of K. D. Williams, Cheung, and Choi (2000), who found greater conformity among ostracized individuals. However, they are inconsistent with the results of K. D. Williams and Sommer (1997), who found that ostracized women worked harder on a subsequent group task. Future research should determine which rejection and ostracism situations lead to passivity and which do not.…”

Nostalgia: Content, triggers, functions.

“…For instance, Williams and Sommers (1997) found that women responded to rejection from a group by working harder on a subsequent collective task. In a similar vein, Gardner, Pickett, and…”

On the Correspondence Between Physiological and Nonverbal Responses: Nonverbal Behavior Accompanying Challenge and Threat

“…Although social interaction is engaging for both males and females, it is most likely to be considered a motivated performance for females as the latter are often more sensitive to interpersonal feedback (e.g., Williams and Sommer 1997). Of these 90 participants, 30 were selected for nonverbal analysis on the basis of their cardiovascular patterns (see section ''Selection of Target Participants'').…”