Spring Break
Why social exclusion will leave you out in the cold
Issue date: 9/25/08
Have you ever been on the receiving end of such an icy stare that you actually felt cold? Research from the University of Toronto has found that this phenomenon is real - not just metaphorical. Social exclusion can lead people to experience lower body temperatures and even seek out warm foods to compensate.
University of Toronto psychologists Chen-Bo Zhong and Geoffrey J. Leonardelli ran an experiment in which participants were randomly assigned to recall an episode in their life during which they experienced either social isolation or inclusion.
Participants were then asked what they thought the current room temperature was. Interestingly enough, those participants who had remembered an event of exclusion were more likely to report the temperature of the room as colder than those who were asked to remember positive social encounters.
A second experiment was then performed to see if similar results would be obtained by mirroring the initial experiment. Subjects were asked to partake in a virtual experiment in which they were told that they would be competing against other players over the Internet.
Although they did not know it, the participants were actually not engaged in a live, online game, but in a controlled computer simulation, which arbitrarily decided to mimic a socially inclusive or exclusive environment by throwing a ball thirty times among the subjects.
Those who received the ball more often in the simulated game were in a more socially inclusive environment. Participants who were left on the virtual sidelines were supposed to feel excluded from the game.
After the conclusion of the computer simulation, subjects participated in a survey they thought was unrelated. They were asked to report how desirable a variety of both hot and cold foods and beverages were to them. Hot foods and beverages, like coffee and chicken noodle soup, most appealed to those that had been selected to be in a socially exclusive environment.
University of Toronto psychologists Chen-Bo Zhong and Geoffrey J. Leonardelli ran an experiment in which participants were randomly assigned to recall an episode in their life during which they experienced either social isolation or inclusion.
Participants were then asked what they thought the current room temperature was. Interestingly enough, those participants who had remembered an event of exclusion were more likely to report the temperature of the room as colder than those who were asked to remember positive social encounters.
A second experiment was then performed to see if similar results would be obtained by mirroring the initial experiment. Subjects were asked to partake in a virtual experiment in which they were told that they would be competing against other players over the Internet.
Although they did not know it, the participants were actually not engaged in a live, online game, but in a controlled computer simulation, which arbitrarily decided to mimic a socially inclusive or exclusive environment by throwing a ball thirty times among the subjects.
Those who received the ball more often in the simulated game were in a more socially inclusive environment. Participants who were left on the virtual sidelines were supposed to feel excluded from the game.
After the conclusion of the computer simulation, subjects participated in a survey they thought was unrelated. They were asked to report how desirable a variety of both hot and cold foods and beverages were to them. Hot foods and beverages, like coffee and chicken noodle soup, most appealed to those that had been selected to be in a socially exclusive environment.
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