Social Rejection

Today’s animation was designed to illustrate some new findings within the field of social cognitive neuroscience. Most people will experience at some point in their lives what scientists called “social pain”, caused for example, by exclusion from a group or by being ignored by a friend or a work colleague.

After scrutinising the brain while people were playing a game called Cyberball (while they were in the scanner), scientists demonstrated that the same regions of the brain that activate when we feel physical pain are the regions that become active when we experience social pain.

The brain uses the same neural circuits for both physical and social pain and pleasures!!!

Nobody likes to be left aside; we all know that. However we normally ignore how painful this is for those who suffer the social isolation.

While running a small group coaching session on Emotional Intelligence a few months ago, one of the participants confessed how lonely he felt (he had been relocated from Singapore to Australia) and how he missed his friends from Singapore.

As a consequence of this, he would not even get up and have a cup of coffee as he felt others did not want to talk or connect with him at all.

As he managed to release this, the rest of the team started to come up with ideas to involve him on a daily basis by inviting him for lunch walks, dinners, etc. His face lit up when the offers started to pour in. People were stunned and totally unaware he was feeling like this.

Observe those around you, do they look lonely or isolated? Are they always looking at the computer and rarely chat with others? Do you ever invite others for coffee rather than the ones you feel most comfortable with?

As shown by scientists, social pain hurts, and it reduces performance as the person’s emotions are likely to be more negative than positive. If you can act on it, do it. You may be improving someone’s life significantly.

About the Animator
Stuart Connacher is a talented Australian 3D artist. Born in Sydney, he will be graduating this year in June from Billy Blue School of Design as a Multimedia Designer.