Effects of social exclusion on motivation and anticipatory pleasure for social interactions in everyday life - an EMA study

Le résumé fourni par la source

Human well-being is deeply intertwined with the need for social bonds (Baumeister & Leary, 1995), and individuals who experience strong social integration generally exhibit better mental health (Seeman, 1996). However, many people experience low social motivation and exhibit social withdrawal, often as part of psychopathology. For example in schizophrenia, social disinterest is a negative symptom (Marder & Galderisi, 2017) representing the extreme psychopathological low end of the continuum of social motivation (Strauss & Cohen, 2017). The lack of effective treatments to reduce social disinterest (Cella et al., 2023; Pos et al., 2019) emphasizes the need to better understand its underlying mechanisms. One pathway may involve a negative impact of social exclusion on social motivation. Experiences of social exclusion elicit immediate pain and reflexive coping responses (Williams, 2009). Prolonged exposure to social exclusion potentially leads to a resignation stage, that has initially been theorized to include feelings of detachment, unworthiness, helplessness, and depression (Riva et al., 2017; Williams, 2009). However, clinical psychological etiological models and initial supporting evidence point to social disinterest as a key element of such a resignation stage. There is growing evidence that adverse social experiences without positive compensation contribute to the development of social disinterest (Jaya et al., 2022). People exhibiting social disinterest, particularly in the context of schizophrenia, show diminished engagement in social activities and tend to spend more time alone (Oorschot et al., 2013). This has been linked to a lack of anticipatory pleasure, which is crucial for driving motivation to engage in social interactions (Kring & Caponigro, 2010). In this study, we investigate how the experience of social exclusion relates to momentary changes in social motivation and anticipatory pleasure for social activities, using Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) to capture real-world experiences of social exclusion. Previous research in laboratory settings has shown that social exclusion instantly reduces social motivation and anticipatory pleasure (Pillny & Lincoln, 2020), but these effects have not yet been studied in daily life. We aim to test whether these declines and a potential recovery in social motivation and anticipatory pleasure following social exclusion can be observed outside the laboratory in everyday life, and to which degree social exclusion-related declines in social motivation relate to actual socializing behavior.

Ce résumé expose les affirmations des auteurs. BNTIC ne l’interprète pas comme une validation indépendante des résultats.