@article{ref1,
title="Adding injury to insult: unexpected rejection leads to more aggressive responses",
journal="Aggressive behavior",
year="2010",
author="Wesselmann, Eric D. and Butler, Fionnuala A. and Williams, Kipling D. and Pickett, Cynthia L.",
volume="36",
number="4",
pages="232-237",
abstract="Previous research indicates that rejection by a group causes aggressive responses. However, in these previous studies, rejected participants were led to believe that they were liked and accepted before the rejection; likely, this rejection was highly unanticipated. Sociometer theory (Leary et al., 1995) proposes the existence of a psychological mechanism (a &quot;sociometer&quot;) that enables individuals to detect potential rejection via others' reactions; a properly working sociometer affords a person predictive control over an interaction. We hypothesized the lack of predictive control inherent in previous rejection studies was a critical contributor to participants' aggressive responses; predictive control should lead to decreased aggression. To test this, we manipulated predictive control by varying confederate behavior toward participants before a rejection manipulation. Results indicate that unpredictable rejection undermined participants' belief that they could predict other's behavior (i.e., led to the perception of a broken sociometer) and led to higher levels of aggression. <p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0096-140X",
doi="10.1002/ab.20347",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ab.20347"
}