Self-compassion defuses the aggression triggered by social exclusion

Abstract

Social exclusion is a pervasive phenomenon that can have profound psychological consequences, including increased aggression. Self-compassion can promote psychological resilience, which helps individuals cope with challenges and may help mitigate the aggression triggered by social exclusion. This study aims to explore the relationship between self-compassion and aggression in the context of social exclusion from both state and trait perspectives. First, a cross-sectional study (Study 1) was conducted; the findings revealed that social exclusion is associated with higher levels of aggression, while self-compassion is linked to lower levels of social exclusion and aggression. Further division of self-compassion into its constituent components (self-kindness, mindfulness, and common humanity) revealed additional insights into the specific roles played by these factors. Self-kindness and mindfulness were found to moderate the relationship between social exclusion and aggression, while common humanity was observed to mediate this relationship. To determine the causal relationships among variables in further detail, an experimental study (Study 2) was designed. This study utilized a recall writing task to induce feelings of social exclusion and employed self-compassion writing tasks to elicit self-compassionate responses from participants. The results of this experiment indicated that self-compassion can significantly reduce the aggression triggered by social exclusion, thus suggesting that self-compassion may help alleviate the distress caused by individuals’ experiences of social exclusion. The findings of this research have important implications for the development of clinical interventions aimed at reducing the adverse effects of social exclusion.

Keywords

aggression / self-compassion / self-regulation / social exclusion

References

[1] Bahrami, R., & Borhani, K. (2023). Excluded and myopic: Social exclusion increases temporal discounting. PLoS One, 18(8), e0290175.

[2] Bakker, A. M., Cox, D. W., Hubley, A. M., & Owens, R. L. (2019). Emotion regulation as a mediator of self-compassion and depressive symptoms in recurrent depression. Mindfulness, 10(6), 1169–1180.

[3] Barnard, L. K., & Curry, J. F. (2011). Self-compassion: Conceptualizations, correlates, & interventions. Review of General Psychology, 15(4), 289–303.

[4] Barry, C. T., Loflin, D. C., & Doucette, H. (2015). Adolescent self-compassion: Associations with narcissism, self-esteem, aggression, and internalizing symptoms in at-risk males. Personality and Individual Differences, 77, 118–123.

[5] Baumeister, R. F., Nathan Dewall, C., Ciarocco, N. J., & Twenge, J. M. (2005). Social exclusion impairs self-regulation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88(4), 589–604.

[6] Breu, F., Guggenbichler, S., & Wollmann, J. (2008). Woman killing: Intimate femicide in Ontario, 1974-1994. Resources for Feminist Research, 26, 151–174. http://medcontent.metapress.com/index/A65RM03P4874243N.pdf

[7] Buckley, K. E., Winkel, R. E., & Leary, M. R. (2004). Reactions to acceptance and rejection: Effects of level and sequence of relational evaluation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40(1), 14–28.

[8] Bushman, B. J., & Baumeister, R. F. (1998). Threatened egotism, narcissism, self-esteem, and direct and displaced aggression: Does self-love or self-hate Lead to violence? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75(1), 219–229.

[9] Buss, A. H., & Perry, M. (1992). The aggression questionnaire. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63(3), 452–459.

[10] Chen, J., Yan, L.-S., & Zhou, L.-H. (2011). Reliability and validity of Chinese version of self-compassion scale. Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology, 19(6), 734–736.

[11] Cohen, J. (1992). A power primer. Psychological Bulletin, 112(1), 155–159.

[12] DeWall, C. N., Baumeister, R. F., Stillman, T. F., & Gailliot, M. T. (2007). Violence restrained: Effects of self-regulation and its depletion on aggression. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 43(1), 62–76.

[13] Dunn, A. M., Heggestad, E. D., Shanock, L. R., & Theilgard, N. (2018). Intra-individual response variability as an indicator of insufficient effort responding: Comparison to other indicators and relationships with individual differences. Journal of Business and Psychology, 33(1), 105–121.

[14] Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Lang, A. G., & Buchner, A. (2007). G*power 3: A flexible statistical power analysis program for the social, behavioral, and biomedical sciences. Behavior Research Methods, 39(2), 175–191.

[15] Fishbein, H. D. (1997). Lifelines and risks: Pathways of youth in our time (book). Mind, Culture, and Activity, 4(3), 218–222.

[16] Fresnics, A., & Borders, A. (2017). Angry rumination mediates the unique associations between self-compassion and anger and aggression. Mindfulness, 8(3), 554–564.

[17] Hair, J. F., Ringle, C. M., & Sarstedt, M. (2011). PLS-SEM: Indeed a silver bullet. Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 19(2), 139–152.

[18] Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1998). Fit indices in covariance structure modeling: Sensitivity to underparameterized model misspecification. Psychological Methods, 3(4), 424–453.

[19] Huang, J. L., Curran, P. G., Keeney, J., Poposki, E. M., & DeShon, R. P. (2012). Detecting and deterring insufficient effort responding to surveys. Journal of Business and Psychology, 27(1), 99–114.

[20] Jarvis, C. B., Mackenzie, S. B., Podsakoff, P. M., Giliatt, N., & Mee, J. F. (2003). A critical review of construct indicators and measurement model misspecification in marketing and consumer research. Journal of Consumer Research, 30(2), 199–218.

[21] Jia, Y., Zhang, S., Jin, T., Zhang, L., Zhao, S., & Li, Q. (2019). The effect of social exclusion on social anxiety of college students in China: The roles of fear of negative evaluation and interpersonal trust. Journal of Psychological Science, 42(3), 653–659. http://www.psysci.org/EN/Y2019/V/I3/653

[22] Jiang, Z., Qi, K., Zhao, Y., Liu, J., & Lv, C. (2022). Other-dehumanization rather than self-dehumanization mediates the relationship between violent video game exposure and aggressive behavior. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 25(1), 37–42.

[23] Klarner, P., Sarstedt, M., Hoeck, M., & Ringle, C. M. (2013). Disentangling the effects of team competences, team adaptability, and client communication on the performance of management consulting teams. Long Range Planning, 46(3), 258–286.

[24] Leary, M. R., Tate, E. B., Adams, C. E., Allen, A. B., & Hancock, J. (2007). Self-compassion and reactions to unpleasant self-relevant events: The implications of treating oneself kindly. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(5), 887–904.

[25] Leary, M. R., Twenge, J. M., & Quinlivan, E. (2006). Interpersonal rejection as a determinant of anger and aggression. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10(2), 111–132.

[26] Leguina, A. (2015). A primer on partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). International Journal of Research & Method in Education, 38(2), 220–221.

[27] Li, X., Phillips, M. R., Zhang, Y., Niu, Y., Tong, Y., & Yang, S. (2011). Development, Reliability and Validity of the Chinese version of Buss & Perry Aggression Questionnaire. Chinese Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases, 37(10), 607–613.

[28] Lindsay, E. K., & Creswell, J. D. (2014). Helping the self help others: self-affirmation increases self-compassion and pro-social behaviors. Frontiers in psychology, 5, 421.

[29] MacBeth, A., & Gumley, A. (2012). Exploring compassion: A meta-analysis of the association between self-compassion and psychopathology. Clinical Psychology Review, 32(6), 545–552.

[30] Maner, J. K., DeWall, C. N., Baumeister, R. F., & Schaller, M. (2007). Does social exclusion motivate interpersonal reconnection? Resolving the “porcupine problem”. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(1), 42–55.

[31] Morata-Ramirez, M. A., Tello, F. P. H., Barbero-García, M. I., & Mendez, G. (2015). Confirmatory factor analysis. Recommendations for unweighted least squares method related to Chi-Square and RMSEA. Acción Psicológica, 12(1), 79–90. https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:210375682

[32] Moreira, H., Gouveia, M. J., & Canavarro, M. C. (2018). Is mindful parenting associated with adolescents’ well-being in early and middle/late adolescence? The mediating role of adolescents’ attachment representations, self-compassion and mindfulness. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 47(8), 1771–1788.

[33] Muris, P., Meesters, C., Pierik, A., & de Kock, B. (2016). Good for the self: Self-compassion and other self-related constructs in relation to symptoms of anxiety and depression in non-clinical youths. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25(2), 607–617.

[34] Neff, K. D. (2003). Self-compassion: An alternative conceptualization of a healthy attitude toward oneself. Self and Identity, 2(2), 85–101.

[35] Neff, K. D. (2011). Self-compassion, self-esteem, and well-being. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 5(1), 1–12.

[36] Neff, K. D., & Beretvas, S. N. (2013). The role of self-compassion in romantic relationships. Self and Identity, 12(1), 78–98.

[37] Neff, K. D., Tóth-Király, I., & Colosimo, K. (2018). Self-compassion is best measured as a global construct and is overlapping with but distinct from neuroticism: A response to Pfattheicher, Geiger, Hartung, Weiss, and Schindler (2017). European Journal of Personality, 32(4), 371–392.

[38] Neff, K. D., Tóth-Király, I., Yarnell, L. M., Arimitsu, K., Castilho, P., Ghorbani, N., Guo, H. X., Hirsch, J. K., Hupfeld, J., Hutz, C. S., Kotsou, I., Lee, W. K., Montero-Marin, J., Sirois, F. M., de Souza, L. K., Svendsen, J. L., Wilkinson, R. B., & Mantzios, M. (2019). Examining the factor structure of the self-compassion scale in 20 diverse samples: Support for use of a total score and six subscale scores. Psychological Assessment, 31(1), 27–45.

[39] Oveis, C., Horberg, E. J., & Keltner, D. (2010). Compassion, pride, and social intuitions of self-other similarity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 98(4), 618–630.

[40] Palermo, G. B. (1997). The berserk syndrome: A review of mass murder. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 2(1), 1–8.

[41] Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2012). Sources of method bias in social science research and recommendations on how to control it. Annual Review of Psychology, 63(1), 539–569.

[42] Riva, P., Lauro, L. J. R., Nathan DeWall, C., Chester, D. S., & Bushman, B. J. (2015). Reducing aggressive responses to social exclusion using transcranial direct current stimulation. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 10(3), 352–356.

[43] Ringle, C. M., Wende, S., & Becker, J. M. (2015). SmartPLS 3. SmartPLS.

[44] Sauter, F. M., Heyne, D., Blöte, A. W., van Widenfelt, B. M., & Westenberg, P. M. (2010). Assessing therapy-relevant cognitive capacities in young people: Development and psychometric evaluation of the self-reflection and insight scale for youth. Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy, 38(3), 303–317.

[45] Stefan, C. A., & Cheie, L. (2022). Self-compassion and social anxiety in late adolescence: Contributions of self-reflection and insight. Self and Identity, 21(2), 210–222.

[46] Terry, M. L., & Leary, M. R. (2011). Self-compassion, self-regulation, and health. Self and Identity, 10(3), 352–362.

[47] Terry, M. L., Leary, M. R., Mehta, S., & Henderson, K. (2013). Self-compassionate reactions to health threats. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39(7), 911–926.

[48] Timeo, S., Riva, P., & Paladino, M. P. (2019). Learning to cope with everyday instances of social exclusion: A review of emotional and cognitive strategies for children and adolescents. Journal of Applied Biobehavioral Research, 24(4), 1–17.

[49] Twenge, J. M., Baumeister, R. F., Tice, D. M., & Stucke, T. S. (2001). If you can’t join them, beat them: Effects of social exclusion on aggressive behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81(6), 1058–1069.

[50] Wu, H., Zhang, S., & Yuqian, Z. (2013). Development and validation of the social exclusion questionnaire for undergraduate. China Journal of Health Psychology, 21(12), 1829–1831.

[51] Zadro, L., Williams, K. D., & Richardson, R. (2004). How low can you go? Ostracism by a computer is sufficient to lower self-reported levels of belonging, control, self-esteem, and meaningful existence. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40(4), 560–567.

[52] Zessin, U., Dickhäuser, O., & Garbade, S. (2015). The relationship between self-compassion and well-being: A meta-analysis. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 7(3), 340–364.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

2024 The Author(s). PsyCh Journal published by Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.