Ostracism: Social Exclusion in Adulthood
If you’ve ever felt like you’re alone in a room of people or rejected by a group before you even made a comment, then you might know what it feels like to be ostracized. I remember high school and how cliques came and went like hair gel and neon colored clothing, but as an adult I really didn’t think ostracism would be a big problem.
Boy, was I wrong.
“Being excluded or ostracized is an invisible form of bullying that doesn’t leave bruises, and therefore we often underestimate its impact.” Kipling D. Williams, Professor of Psychological Sciences at Purdue (Purdue.edu)
I recently found out that the emotional bruising of ostracism can be as powerful as any cutting words ever uttered by a past bully. I’m well into my forties, closer to fifty than forty, and I’ve believed myself to be a relatively resilient and sensible person, able to shake off people coming and going from my life and comfortable with being the wallflower in a room of people, but I’ve found that the older I get the more I feel the need to know the whys of what happened when things don’t go as planned in a social setting. Maybe it’s a desire to find closure from bullying in my youth, or maybe it’s a belief that there’s no reason adults can’t at least interact pleasantly even if they’re strangers, but I’ve found that sometimes people truly don’t want to meet new people and sometimes they’re absolutely and vehemently opposed to even being friendly.
Such an event happened recently to me.
I was at a gathering of like-minded people, according to the organizers. The first hour was social interaction time before an organized sit down session for discussion and planning. After grabbing a drink at the bar, I approached a group of four women and one man who seemed to be having a nice conversation. The only other two people in the room were the organizers and they were checking people in. I waited for a natural break in the conversation and introduced myself to the group. Instead of welcoming words, I stood cast in the shadow of silence and afforded no eye contact. One of the women turned to the others and said, “Maybe we should find a table for the four of us and sit down.” Four. All the tables were for only four.
In my mind, I tried to explain the behavior with their similar ages and their dialogue as they walked away, which I’ll explain later, as odd — just odd, not wrong at that time. They were younger than myself, maybe by ten to fifteen years, but once we get out of high school or at least past the age of 18, age is less a social interface factor to me. At that point, we’re all adults. At least I thought so.
The one speaking rolled her eyes while gesturing her head to her right. The other three all turned and followed the apparent leader. I quickly understood either I wasn’t welcome in their social circle or maybe I’d made some unredeemable gaffe that I wasn’t cognizant of. So with some trepidation of why I was still there, I found a seat by myself, and no one sat with me the entire night. It was the most uncomfortable I’ve ever been in a room of twenty-plus people. It was like I had a tattoo on my forehead saying “Not worthy of interaction or attention.”
Maybe I did.
After I left the meeting, I came back home and I relived the night with my husband. With a shrug of his shoulders, his response was “Sometimes people won’t like you. Bullies exist even in adulthood.”
I don’t think that’s what was happening here, but maybe I don’t want to think that’s what it was to protect myself, too. I was pleasant. I waited for my opening. I didn’t intrude or make a social sin in timing. I did everything I normally do and yet, I felt the wrath of what seemed like the “mean girls” club. I did everything technically and socially appropriate but people I didn’t even know rejected and excluded me. People I might never have been accepted by or wanted to be accepted by anyway, but not being given the chance was painful.
And what made me even more uncomfortable was my own reaction after. I withdrew from trying to get to know anyone. Granted, I’m not the flitting butterfly at a party and tend to find comfort in listening to people, so it’s not totally unexpected. Plus, I am an INFP (Mediator) on the personality traits screening (https://www.16personalities.com/infp-personality), which means that I tend to want to engage people more than I want to do the speaking. Although not my favorite thing to do, I will make the effort to introduce myself to people I don’t know, because I believe people are genuinely worth the energy, and I’m interested in knowing more about people and their experiences.
But in my withdrawal from even attempting to talk to anyone, I found myself even being short with an innocent bystander — the bartender. I focused my frustration with the situation on someone else, trying to assert my ability to make friends in a backfiring method. I ended up apologizing to her before the evening was over and she laughed it off saying that she didn’t even notice, but I did. I’d altered my behavior because of being excluded.
Before we talk about ostracism, let’s discuss the difference between ostracizing and bullying. In general, ostracizing is not a repeated behavior between two or more people; it’s a one-and-done quick hit to a person’s desire to be accepted. However, bullying is the long-term systematic breaking down of a person either emotionally or physically. The intent of bullying is damage either in pain or self-esteem.
So why do adults ostracize? Some of the reasons are power, social status, and prejudices. Those who exclude may do so to exert their power over another. This is sometimes exhibited in work situations. A manager may create a clique of favored workers to gain confidences and information over other employees. This behavior has very little consequence to the ostracizer as ostracizing is an inactive form of punishment or behavior control. Instead of admonishing bad behavior or an error in performance, the manager can send a direct signal that a person needs to change to be accepted. Second, the ostracizer can claim to be oblivious to their egregious act and profess the exclusion was only oversight and no harm was meant. “We’re all human” can be applied liberally to the situation to dismiss the seemingly one-off blunder. These people tend to be overly repentant with their profession of innocence, but still got what they wanted — a realization of their power over the other person.
The achievement of social status through ostracizing can be seen in the “mean girl or guy” effect that many of us experienced in high school. Those bullies created a hierarchy of the social ladder and employed ostracizing to achieve or maintain their own relationships with influential group members in the group and avoid their own ostracism (Frontiersin.org, Eisenberger et al., 2010). They label people in an effort to classify and justify exclusion from their collective. “Oh, she’s an art-head,” or “He’s just a jock,” although they may seem to be non-damaging categorizations, any labels in society create rungs of a social ladder that puts one group above another and creates limits. People aren’t only their hobby or their choice of sport, they are multifaceted with complex layers of desires and abilities, and limiting their skills or worth to just one category can be very damaging to a person’s self-esteem and intrinsic worth. This is the ultimate goal of the “mean girls/guys.” After they exclude someone, they retain their status as more influential and worthy of attention, increasing their social standing in the process. However, “When people are too heavily influenced by superficial indicators and ignore actual information, it can quickly lead to misjudgments with serious consequences” (Medicalxpress.com).
Lastly, ostracizers often have prejudices that they’re either plainly stating or exhibiting in their behavior. They desire to keep their group untainted by outsiders with one classification of people, often those who will support them in this desire because if they don’t they too run the risk of being an outcast. In my personal experience, I wonder if those women at this gathering were possibly ageist, or at least the leader of the group seemed that way. Why do I believe this? I caught tidbits of conversation from her saying, “Old people need to listen, not talk.” and “That’s what got us into this problem in the first place.” Sigh… old people. I’m not that old and these wrinkles are a sign of understanding and a patience that was tried but not diminished, but I digress. Since all I gave was my name, my first-timer status to the group, and what I wanted to glean from the night’s program, I can’t imagine how they discerned my age, other than by visual context. But more than ageists, we can see ostracism with races, genders, sexual orientations, disabilities, and so much more. If someone hasn’t experienced ostracism in their life, I highly suspect that they just have the coping mechanisms that mitigated the occurrence to mean less to them or they themselves were the ostracizer.
However, as much as it hurts to be ostracized, studies have shown that the ostracizer also experiences effects that are detrimental. “Social aggression in childhood is an important predictor of later social and psychological adjustment problems,” (Healthline.com). Bullies and ostracizers often lack the ability to read the intentions of others, interpreting kindness and casual interaction as having ulterior motives or for personal gain purposes and doubting genuine interest from strangers or those they interpret as not in their social set as meddlers and overreaching to gain a new status.
This behavior has long been seen as a result of environment and not biology, however, some of our behaviors and instincts are learned and passed on from generation to generation so that assumption could be false. For instance, competition is a learned behavior, but to survive we have learned to be both successful in our alliances and resilient from any rejected behaviors. Additionally, about a quarter of the variation in leadership role occupancy is heritable (Sciencedirect.com), lending credence to the thought that perhaps some dominant traits are inherited and thus, bullying might have a genetic component and not only the product of nurturing.
I wonder if those women were more like or unlike their mothers and fathers in their behaviors, and if they had a genetic disposition toward leading with a tendency to deliver their message with a tone meant to hurt or to control could they be trained out of these behaviors.
So what can we do when we feel ostracized? First, recognize what happened. It can be shocking and you might be taken aback. Take a minute to center yourself and examine the details of what happened. Make sure it wasn’t an accidental social faux pas. Did you interrupt someone? Did you make a joke that wasn’t well received? We all make mistakes. But… if it wasn’t a mistake and the unacceptable behavior was fully on the ostracizer, then you have a choice.
You can either stand up to the ostracizer or decide to let what happened go, releasing the pain and event like the seeds of a dandelion blowing on the wind. This can be a very difficult decision. Standing up means confrontation. Take a second to consider what you want to say, how you want to say it, and where you want to say it. Calling someone out in front of their “group” can present dangers, socially and possibly even physically. Some people will not take the tactic well and consider the directness a threat. Know as much as you can about your ostracizer as possible to plan how to approach them. If you decide to let it go, then do just that. Find a place of serenity inside yourself and make it clear to yourself that you will not allow multiple acts of ostracism or bullying, but you are willing to put the incident behind you to move on with your life.
Lastly, find someone to talk to. Whether it’s a partner, friend, clergy, or mental health professional. If you are unable to face the pain on your own, please find a welcoming ear and voice the hurt to flush it from your emotional system. Holding the objectionable act and the resulting feelings inside can have detrimental effects on your self-esteem and your need to belong. You are special. You deserve polite and respectful treatment. You deserve to belong and to be heard. Ostracism hurts, but you can grow from the situation and maybe help the ostracizer face their own unacceptable behavior.
It’s easy to understand that not everyone will always get along, but if the choice is between acceptance and ostracism, I’ll choose acceptance as my behavior every time. Now, I will get another chance to meet up with these people in the future for another event in August. You can be assured that I will make another attempt at interaction. Even if it fails, I feel like it’s presenting an alternative behavior for them to see and maybe — just maybe — one of them will emulate my polite behavior in the future.
Have you faced adult ostracism? In the workplace? School? Church? Gathering? I’d love to hear how you’ve handled social exclusion.
I invite you to join my newsletter to hear about updates with my writing and future speaking engagements. https://julesdixon.substack.com/
References:
Healthline.com. “Mean Girls” Beware: Ostracism Is Just as Harmful for the Bully. March 9, 2013. Retrieved July 8, 2019 from https://www.healthline.com/health-news/children-those-who-exclude-also-get-hurt-030913#1.
Medicalxpress.com. Is it their own fault? How people judge the exclusion of others. June 20, 2018. Retrieved July 8, 2019, from https://medicalxpress.com/news/2018-06-fault-people-exclusion.html.
Purdue.edu. Professor: Pain of ostracism can be deep, long lasting. May 10, 2011. Retrieved from https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/research/2011/110510WilliamsOstracism.html
Sciencedirect.com Born to lead? A twin design and genetic association study of leadership role occupancy. Retrieved July 8, 2019 from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1048984312000811?via%3Dihub
Williams, Kipling D., Ostracism. Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 58, January 2007. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1077375
**This content is for general knowledge only. It is not intended nor implied to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.