The Rejected and The Bullied
RUNNING HEAD: THE REJECTED AND THE BULLIED
The Rejected and the Bullied:
Lessons about Social Misfits from Developmental Psychology
Jaana Juvonen and Elisheva F. Gross
University of California, Los Angeles
Draft of Presentation at the 7th Annual Sydney Symposium of Social Psychology:
“The Social Outcast: Ostracism, Social Exclusion, Rejection, and Bullying”
To be included as a chapter in:
Williams, K. D., Forgas, J. P., & von Hippel, W. (Eds.) under contract). The social outcast:
Ostracism, social exclusion, rejection, and bullying. New York: Psychology Press.
Address Correspondence to:
Jaana Juvonen
Department of Psychology
University of California, Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1521
(310) 825-8293
e-mail: juvonen@psych.ucla.edu
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The Rejected and the Bullied:
Lessons about Social Misfits from Developmental Psychology
The study of social outcasts among children has a long tradition in developmental
psychology. This topic has played a prominent role in social developmental research in part
because of the surprisingly potent power of the consequences of being rejected or bullied.
Rejected and bullied children are at risk for a range of subsequent problems, including dropping
out of school, compromised mental health, and criminality (Parker & Asher, 1987; Kupersmidt,
Dodge & Coie, 1990). More recently, this topic has received renewed attention in light of media
accounts of infamous school shootings in the US. Many of the youngsters who hurt and killed
their schoolmates and teachers were allegedly bullied and rejected by their peers.
The goal of this chapter is to provide insights from developmental research on the
complex array of intrapersonal and interpersonal difficulties that both lead to and result from
peer rejection. To highlight the distinctive contributions of developmental psychology to our
understanding of social outcasts, we begin by comparing the last decade of relevant research
published in developmental and social psychology’s leading journals. Following this brief
analysis, we review the developmental research in light of three guiding questions: 1) who is
most at risk for rejection; 2) what are the consequences of rejection and bullying, and 3) who is
immune from these consequences? We then propose an integrative model of the intrapersonal
and group-level processes by which peer rejection leads to long-term maladaptive outcomes. We
conclude by exploring the implications of our review and proposed model for the social
psychological study of rejection. Throughout our review, we highlight the role of the social, and
specifically the peer group, contexts of rejection.
In our developmental analysis of rejection, we focus on peers for both theoretical and
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practical reasons. From a theoretical perspective, same or similar age peers provide a unique
developmental context. In contrast to relationships with adults, peer relationships are
presumably more symmetrical or balanced in terms of power. Among peers, children gain
important insights about equality, reciprocity, loyalty, and trustworthiness (Berndt, 1996).
Furthermore, peer relationships, and friendships in particular, provide opportunities for “social
practice” in interpersonal behaviors that are critical to both current and future relationship
development and maintenance. These behaviors include cooperation, negotiation, compromise,
conflict resolution, and the provision and seeking of social support (Hartup, 1996). In light of
the developmental functions served by healthy peer relationships, it is therefore important to
understand what happens to children who are social outcasts deprived of normative opportunities
for social practice. In the present review, we therefore include only studies that examine
rejection and bullying by same- or similar-age peers, (to the exclusion of rejection by parents and
romantic partners, for example).
A second reason to focus on peers in reviewing the developmental research on rejection
and bullying is practical: Most developmental investigators conceptualize rejection in terms of
perceptions, preferences and behaviors directed toward an individual by familiar peers, as
opposed to strangers or romantic partners. In so doing, developmentalists have forged a path
toward understanding social outcasts that is often distinct, both methodologically and
conceptually, from that taken by social psychologists.
A note on terms: The many faces of peer rejection. As anyone who has been picked last
for kickball, endured ridicule or nasty rumors from ostensible friends, or sprinted home to avoid
the neighborhood bully will attest, there are numerous ways to experience peer rejection.
Following Asher, Rose and Gabriel (2001), who undertook the onerous task of counting those
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ways (and counted 32), we employ the term “peer rejection” inclusively. It should be noted,
however, that this is not typical of developmental psychologists who normally differentiate
bullying or victimization by peers from peer rejection. In developmental research, rejection is
commonly defined as peers’ social avoidance of, dislike of, or reluctance to affiliate with an
individual child. In contrast, bullying is conceptualized as an active form of hostility toward a
target (rather than mere avoidance or dislike) that is characterized by an imbalance of power
(Olweus, 1978), such as a strong person intimidating a weaker one. Bullying can take many
forms including physical aggression, exclusion, and spreading nasty rumors. Bullying is
typically carried out by one or a few children, although bullied children are often also rejected by
the larger peer group (Graham & Juvonen, 1998; Juvonen, Graham, & Schuster, 2003).
In the present review, we include bullying within the broad category of peer rejection
because we presume that from the perspective of the target of rejection or bullying the
experiences are more similar than different. We also propose that although the manifestations of
rejection (avoidance) and bullying (hostility) vary, the action of non-inclusion or exclusion
serves similar functions for the group (i.e., the rejectors). We therefore review developmental
research on rejection and bullying as two conceptually and empirically related phenomena
relevant to understanding the social outcast. But how do developmental psychologists study peer
rejection and bullying? We now turn to a brief comparison between developmental and social
psychological research.
A Decade of Studying the Outcast: Comparing Developmental and Social Studies
We conducted an analysis of relevant studies published between 1993 and 2003 in the
two leading journals in developmental psychology (Child Development and Developmental
Psychology) and social psychology (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and
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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin), respectively (see Appendix). Based on a search
using six key words (rejection, exclusion, ostracism, harassment, victimization, and bullying), a
total of 145 articles were identified (49% were published in the social psychology journals).
This method is a short-hand way to represent the two fields and, as such, has limitations.
Nevertheless, this quick comparison reveals striking differences in conceptualizations and
methodological approaches across the two areas of psychology.
What Constitutes Rejection?
Chronic versus discrete experiences. As shown in the Appendix, most developmentalists
examine rejection and bullying experiences as chronic social problems rather than isolated
interpersonal experiences. As shown in Table 1, 89% of the developmental publications,
compared to 45% of the social psychology articles published within the last decade investigated
rejection as a repeated experience or chronic problem. The chronicity of the social experience is
reflected in developmental measures of rejection that indicate sociometric status or social
standing. Children are typically asked to name the individuals (e.g., classmates) whom they do
not like or with whom they do not want to affiliate (i.e., play or “hang out”). An individual’s
rejected status is based on the number or proportion of such nominations within the group (see
Cillessen & Bukowski, 2000, for a comprehensive review of these methods). Rejection is thus
operationalized as the consensus or overall attitude of the group toward one of its members. The
operational prerequisite for group consensus means that rejected status is likely to be based on
recurring rejection experiences, as opposed to fleeting or isolated incidents. Developmental
studies that rely on such indicators of social status stand in sharp contrast to social psychological
studies in which participants often describe or undergo a discrete incident of rejection. Three
quarters of the social psychological studies and only 26% of the developmental articles examined
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discrete social rejection, ostracism, or bullying incidents. Notably, some studies (24% in social
and 13% in developmental) investigated both short-term and chronic forms of rejection.
Self-reported versus other-reported rejection. Who determines whether an individual is
rejected? Given the aforementioned popularity of peer nomination procedures in developmental
research, it is not surprising that 78% of the last decade’s developmental studies assessed
rejection based on others’ perceptions. In addition to peer ratings or nominations assessing
group sentiment toward a target child (e.g., dislike or avoidance), measures of behavioral or
social reputation (e.g., “Who bullies others?” or “Who gets bullied?”) are also used. Social
psychological studies assessed others’ perceptions of social outcasts much less frequently (18%).
Instead, 97% of non-experimental investigations in social psychology journals relied on selfreports of rejection (as compared to 23% of non-experimental developmental studies).
Who is doing the rejecting? One of the most notable differences between the social and
developmental studies pertains to the source of rejection: 96% of the developmental studies
versus 54% of the social psychological studies examined perceptions or acts of rejection by
familiar others (e.g., classmates), as opposed to strangers, who were the source of rejection in
48% of social and just 4% of developmental investigations. In addition, only 16% of the
developmental studies, compared to 75% of the social psychological studies, involved rejection
by one individual (as opposed to a group). The relatively few developmental studies of rejection
by an individual mainly focused on maternal rejection (a topic excluded from our review).
Experimental, Correlational, and Longitudinal Designs
As shown in Table 1, the vast majority (81%) of the relevant studies on social outcasts
published in the developmental journals were non-experimental, whereas those published in
social psychology journals are fairly evenly split between experimental (51%) and non-
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experimental (49%). As we will discuss later, the correlational nature of developmental studies
hinders inferences about whether developmental outcomes associated with rejection (e.g.,
criminality) are better explained by the antecedents of rejection (e.g., aggressive tendencies)
rather than by rejection per se. In 70% of the social psychology experiments, the rejection
experience was experimentally manipulated. In 42% of these studies, however, rejection did not
involve actual interpersonal interaction with the source of rejection (either in person or via
phone, video or computer). In these cases, rejection was communicated on paper only or by the
experimenter. This form of rejection manipulation was used in only one developmental study.
When developmental psychologists make use of experimental methods, they often
employ contrived play group procedures in which participants are assigned to play in groups of
unfamiliar peers for a series of brief sessions. This method allows investigators to study the
behaviors and emerging social status of previously unfamiliar children in a relatively controlled
setting. In past developmental studies, this approach has been used to examine both antecedents
and consequences of rejection and bullying (Rabiner & Coie, 1989; Schwartz, Dodge, & Coie,
1993), as well as the stability of rejection across groups (Coie & Kupersmidt, 1983).
Among the non-experimental studies, about half of the developmental investigations
were longitudinal, in contrast to 21% of the social investigations. Although not equally prevalent
in the two disciplines, the mean length of the longitudinal studies in developmental and social
psychological studies was similar (Ms = 40 and 35 months, respectively).
In sum, in comparison to social psychological research, developmental research on social
outcasts more often 1) employs correlational and longitudinal designs, 2) focuses on chronic
rather than discrete experiences of rejection, and 3) assesses rejected or bullied status based on
the consensus of the peer group. Although each approach has its limitations, the developmental
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research on antecedents and correlates of persistent rejection by familiar peers can provide a
more complete picture of the evolution or unfolding of rejection and the group functions
rejection may serve.
We now begin our review of the developmental body of research by asking: what causes
an individual to become a social outcast? Rather than provide an exhaustive review of the
hundreds of studies that have examined the antecedents of rejection and bullying (see Hawker &
Bolder, 2001; Kupersmidt et al., 1990; McDougall, Hymel, Vaillancourt, & Mercer, 2001, for
comprehensive reviews), we propose that the most parsimonious account for the cause of peer
rejection is person-group dissimilarity.
The Social Outcast as Group Misfit
Although virtually everyone experiences peer rejection or bullying at some point in their
childhood or adolescence, repeated rejection and chronic bullying are neither random nor
universal experiences. Numerous studies indicate that aggressive and socially withdrawn youth
are most likely to be cast out from the group (e.g, Boivin, Hymel, & Bukowski, 1995; Rubin,
LeMare, & Lollis, 1990). Associations between peer rejection and aggression as well as between
rejection and social withdrawal have also been observed cross-culturally, among Italian (Tomada
& Schneider, 1997), Chinese (Schwartz, Chang & Farver, 2001), and Indonesian children and
adolescents (French, Jansen, & Pidada, 2002).
What can account for children and adolescents’ intolerance for aggression and social
withdrawal among their peers? When Coie and Pennington (1976) asked children to describe
someone who is “different from other kids,” aggression and shyness were among the behavioral
descriptions most frequently mentioned by first- through eleventh-grade students. Similar results
were obtained in a study with 12-year-old Finnish children (Juvonen, 1991). Younger, Gentile,
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and Burgess (1993) have likewise shown that both aggression and social withdrawal are
perceived as deviant in middle childhood. Hence, the associations between peer rejection and
both aggression and social withdrawal may in part reflect that these behaviors are among the
most salient deviations from group behavioral norms across childhood and adolescence.
There is a small body of developmental research specifically testing the deviancerejection hypothesis. These studies suggest that determinants of rejection are not necessarily
invariant across all groups; rather, they differ depending on the prevailing group norms.
The Person-Group Misfit Model
Wright et al. (1986) were the first to formally propose and test a norm-based model of
rejection. They examined associations between individual behavior and peer status in groups of
10-year-old boys at a summer camp for children with behavioral difficulties. They found that
aggression and withdrawal each predicted peer rejection only in groups in which the behavior
was non-normative. In groups displaying low levels of aggressive behavior (e.g., verbal threats,
hitting), aggressive individuals were rejected. In contrast, in high-aggression groups, social
withdrawal was the non-normative and less accepted behavior, whereas aggressive behavior was
unrelated to peer status.
This landmark study provided strong initial evidence for the importance of group
composition in determining who gets rejected. Aggression, commonly conceived as an invariant
cause of peer rejection, was instead shown to cause rejection only when it represented deviance
from group norms. More recent investigations have found similar group effects. Using an
experimental paradigm, Boivin, Dodge, and Coie (1995) found relations among aggressive, prosocial, and withdrawn behaviors, group behavioral composition, and social preference that were
similar to those reported by Wright and colleagues. Moreover, their findings are even more
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consistent with the person-group misfit hypothesis than Wright et al.’s. Among novel play
groups composed of African American boys recruited from first and third grades of a local
elementary school, both withdrawn and aggressive behaviors predicted low status in groups in
which the behavior was infrequent.
A more recent large-scale naturalistic study provides further support for the person-group
misfit model (Stormshak, Bierman, Bruschi, Dodge, & Coie, 1999). Using multilevel modeling
techniques to simultaneously test group- and individual-level patterns of associations across
2895 children in 134 first-grade classrooms, Stormshak and colleagues (1999) found strong
evidence that the relation between certain individual behaviors and peer preference varied by
classroom context. Interestingly, they found distinct contextual effects for aggression, social
withdrawal, pro-social behavior and inattention/hyperactivity. Whereas aggression and social
withdrawal varied in their acceptability across classrooms in a manner consistent with Wright et
al. (1986) and Boivin et al. (1995), pro-social behavior and inattention/hyperactivity were
invariant in their associations with social preference, with pro-social positively related and
inattention/hyperactivity negatively related to social preference.
Although most studies of person-group misfit share a focus on aggressive, withdrawn and
pro-social behaviors as correlates of acceptance and rejection, there are exceptions. A recent
study of 9-, 13-, and 16-year-old Chinese youth showed that relations between academic
performance and social acceptance varied according to group academic performance (Chen,
Chang & He, 2003). For example, in high achieving groups, low achievers were less accepted
than high achievers. This investigation is also notable for defining the group not simply as the
classroom, but rather in terms of self- and peer-defined social networks within the larger school
setting (e.g., Cairns, Cairns, & Neckerman, 1989; Cairns & Cairns, 1994). This approach
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provides a more precise definition of the peer group and lends itself to the study of older youth,
for whom a single classroom no longer necessarily represents the sole or even primary source of
peer affiliations.
Development as a Dynamic Normative Context
The studies reviewed thus far suggest that the violation of social norms predicts peer
rejection. Indeed, social norm violation has been shown to predict rejection among children as
young as four years old (Clifford, 1963). However, what constitutes non-normative or deviant
behavior might vary according to age. Accordingly, the correlates of rejection are expected to
differ. For example, the types of aggression that predict rejection vary by age. Across the
elementary school years, the strength of association between rejection and overt forms of
aggression (e.g., hitting) wanes as children practice more indirect forms of aggression, such as
ostracism or spreading rumors (see Coie, Dodge, & Kupersmidt, 1990, for a review).
In one multi-age group study, patterns of association among peer ratings of popularity,
unpopularity, and specific interpersonal behaviors reversed when children entered adolescence
(LaFontana & Cillessen, 2002, Study 1). Physical and relational aggression were positively
correlated with unpopularity among younger participants, but positively correlated with
popularity among adolescents. Withdrawal, in turn, was not associated with unpopularity until
seventh grade. Similarly, it has been shown that the correlations between peer status and both
isolated and overemotional (cf. manifestations of social withdrawal) behaviors become stronger
by fourth and fifth grades compared to earlier grades (Coie et al., 1990; Wood, Cowan, & Baker,
2002). What can account for the observed age-based shifts in the social norms governing
rejection?
Cognitive developmental influences and constraints. The changing social evaluations of
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behavior across age may be at least partially accounted for by changes in the cognitive capacities
of the evaluators. Younger et al. (1993) have shown that whereas aggression is a salient
behavioral dimension in first-graders’ peer assessments, withdrawal behaviors are less welldefined but become progressively more well-defined—and less acceptable—in children’s
perceptions across the elementary school years. Younger and colleagues discuss multiple
explanations for this relatively late development, including the greater cognitive complexity of
withdrawn versus aggressive schemas (the former relying more than the latter on an
understanding of inner states, which are not commonly incorporated into young children’s
interpersonal perceptions; e.g., Peevers & Secord, 1973), the fact that withdrawn behavior is not
as easily categorized as morally “bad” as aggressive behavior, and, most relevant to the present
review, the gradual normative increases in children’s social interactivity across the elementary
school years.
Normative shifts in adolescence: Dissociation between peer and adult values. An
examination of adolescent social norms or values offers a promising explanation for the startling
reversals in the social acceptability of aggression in adolescence. By adolescence, peers may not
only tolerate, but even admire and ascribe dominance and popularity to aggressive and assertive
individuals (Luthar & McMahon, 1996; Parkhurst & Hopmeyer, 1998; LaFontana & Cillessen,
2002). This shift may be part of a broader trend toward increased normativeness of adult rule
violations in adolescence (Allen, Weissberg, & Hawkins, 1989; Coie, Terry, Lenox, & Lochman,
1995; Moffitt, 1993). The individual who deviates from adult norms may be an outcast as a
child but a hero as a teenager. Among the possible explanations for the observed dissociation
between adult and adolescent norms is that adolescents, uncomfortable with the gap between
their newfound physical maturity and restricted social status, perceive aggressive and anti-social
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peers to have the mature social status they seek (Moffitt, 1993). Another explanation for the
popularity of aggressive youth may be that the need to fortify one’s developing social identity
results in a polarization of the values associated with the ingroup (i.e., peer society) versus the
outgroup (i.e., adult society; Juvonen & Cadigan, 2002).
In sum, a growing body of evidence suggests that aggressive and withdrawn behaviors
that are often considered invariant or universal behavioral predictors of peer rejection may be
more accurately and parsimoniously conceptualized as behaviors that invite exclusion and
hostility from the group to the extent that they deviate from group norms. Group effects on the
predictors of rejection and victimization have been found for groups defined by age, social
network, and assignment (e.g., classroom or experimental play group). Although this evidence
indicates that one of the group functions of rejection is to mark, and presumably limit, group
deviance, a critical question remains to be addressed: what is the effect of peer rejection on the
deviant individual? If, as we propose, rejection and bullying serve to deter deviance from group
norms, then these group behaviors should be experienced as aversive by targets, in a manner
analogous to the painful burn experienced by a child who is learning that hot stoves should be
avoided.
The Aversive Consequences of Being Rejected or Bullied
We now turn to the question of rejection’s consequences. As indicated by our review of
the last decade’s research in the two leading developmental journals, it is often debatable
whether what are conceptualized as “consequences” of exclusion are in fact mere correlates or
antecedents of rejection and bullying (see Parker & Asher, 1987). Tests of causal models that
span relatively long time periods may be most effective in distinguishing consequences from
correlates and antecedents; we therefore focus here on a few key longitudinal studies. It should
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be noted, however, that even longitudinal studies (cf. Parker and Asher, 1987) often failed to
control for behavioral correlates of rejection in predictions of adjustment outcomes. Hence, few
studies can conclusively identify whether rejection precedes or exerts an independent impact on
manifestations of distress, as opposed to serving merely as a marker or indicator of concurrent or
pre-existing difficulties.
Direct Effects of Rejection on Social Distress
In a study capitalizing on transition to a new school, Vernberg, Abwender, Ewell, and
Beery (1992) examined the longitudinal associations between bullying experiences and social
anxiety. They found that socially anxious young teens were no more likely than their nonanxious peers to experience bullying in the new school, but teens who were bullied were at
increased risk for social avoidance and distress about new situations one month into the schoolyear. These findings are consistent with a four-year prospective study of kindergartners
(Kochenderfer-Ladd & Wardrop, 2001) showing that children who became victims of bullying in
subsequent grades did not initially differ from their non-victimized peers but later reported
feeling more lonely. In a study of Italian sixth- and seventh-graders, Kiesner (2002) reported that
peer preference (computed as the difference between the number of “liked most” and “liked
least” nominations a child receives) predicted depressive symptoms two years later, even after
controlling for prior levels of depression. In sum, earlier experiences of bullying and rejection do
predict subsequent emotional pain.
If social withdrawal is conceptualized as a behavioral manifestation of distress, then there
is additional evidence for the prediction that rejection produces social pain. In a study examining
the emergence of bullying in novel play groups, Schwartz et al. (1993) found that non-assertive
boys, who emerged as victims of peer maltreatment across multiple play sessions, became
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increasing withdrawn as the group’s behavior became more targeted, negative, and coercive
toward them. The most victimized boys spent less and less time in social play as they received
increasing negative responses from their peers. Similarly, in one of the first studies of contrived
play groups, Dodge (1983) found that boys who were neglected (i.e., not liked or disliked) by
their peers displayed high levels of withdrawn behavior only after receiving repeated rebuffs
from their peers. To return to the analogy of the child at a hot stove, these findings convey that
the child who experiences pain in response to the burn of the stove’s heat is likely to
subsequently avoid the stove altogether.
Evidence that rejection can lead to further withdrawal, coupled with the fact that rejection
appears to be most strongly associated with social distress among withdrawn youth (e.g., Crrick
& Ladd, 1993; Rubin et al., 1993), suggests a plausible alternative account for increases in social
distress: might social withdrawal be a more direct predictor than rejection per se? Not according
to at least one longitudinal study, in which the relation between withdrawal and distress was fully
mediated by peer rejection: that is, children who withdrew further from peers across a one-year
period became more lonely to the degree that their withdrawn behavior led them to be more
rejected by classmates.
The research reviewed above indicates that rejection and bullying place youth at
increased risk for emotional as well as behavioral difficulties. However, in real life, these
associations are decidedly more complex, inasmuch as the consequences of rejection in turn
increase the risk for subsequent maltreatment by peers. We next review evidence from
longitudinal research that takes into account the bidirectional nature of associations between
rejection and distress.
Bidirectional Links Between Rejection and Distress
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In a one-year longitudinal study of bullying among young teens, the fit of two path
models were compared: one model in which emotional distress triggers peer victimization and
the one in which victimization triggers distress (Nishina, Witkow, & Juvonen, 2003). The
findings revealed that psychological indicators of social pain—depression, social anxiety, and
loneliness—may both cause and be caused by bullying experiences. Similarly, Egan and Perry
(1998) found that low self-regard predicted increased risk of being bullied and that bullying
experiences also predicted negative self-views across a one-year time interval. Bidirectional
associations were also reported by Hodges and colleagues (1999): teacher-reported internalizing
and externalizing problems increased the likelihood of being perceived a victim by peers, and
peer reputation as a victim itself increased the likelihood of experiencing subsequent
internalizing and externalizing problems. These data suggest that psychologically vulnerable
youth are easy targets and when they are bullied, they become even more vulnerable.
Effects of Chronicity of Rejection Experiences
Research distinguishing chronic from temporary or transient peer rejection has indicated
that the presence and intensity of aversive outcomes may depend on the chronicity or duration of
rejection or victimization experiences (e.g., DeRosier, Kupersmidt, & Patterson, 1994). For
example, Vernberg et al. (1992) found repeated self-reported bullying experiences to predict
social avoidance and distress at the end of the school year. Burks, Dodge and Price (1995) also
identified long-term but not temporary rejection as a risk factor for later internalizing problems
such as depression, loneliness, and social withdrawal. In their study, boys rejected by their peers
for two consecutive years displayed significantly more internalizing problems in the short and
long term than boys rejected for only one year, who did not differ from never-rejected peers in
terms of internalizing problems (Burks et al., 1995).
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In further support of the claim that the stability of rejection experiences matters, recent
data document that temporary experiences of bullying do not necessarily have long-lasting
emotional impact. For example, Kochenderfer-Ladd and Wardrop (2001) observed no significant
differences between third-grade children bullied only in kindergarten (but not subsequently) and
non-victimized peers. Similarly, Juvonen, Nishina, & Graham (2000) demonstrated that young
teens bullied in the beginning of the study but not a year later did not differ from non-victimized
peers in terms of feelings of depression, loneliness, and self-esteem. Hence, the negative effects
of bullying or rejection can be short-lived; however, prolonged or continued experience increases
the probability of social and emotional pain.
What contributes to the stability (or instability) of rejection? Kochenderfer and Ladd
(1997) found that among 5- and 6-year-olds, aggressive retaliation (fighting back) increased the
likelihood of continued victimization. In contrast, having a friend was associated with decreased
bullying among boys. Hence, the victim’s behavioral response and his or her social affiliations
are likely to play a role in maintaining or ending peer maltreatment.
These is also some evidence that also the expectations of the rejected youth play a role in
maintaining (or changing) their social experiences. By relying on contrived peer group
methodology, Rabiner and Coie (1989) showed that the mere manipulation of expectations of the
sociometrically rejected children improved their social status within the novel play groups
consisting of non-rejected peers. The sociometrically rejected children, who were told that their
new playmates liked them after their initial play group meeting, were better liked than the
randomized control group not receiving such positive expectation induction. In this study, no
behavioral difference between the experimental and control groups were identified. Hence, it
remains unclear how positive expectations “worked” to produce more favorable reactions.
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Nevertheless, these findings indicate that expectations on the part of the rejected children play a
part in maintaining or changing others’ reactions toward them.
Expectations and attributional biases of peers (or rejectors) also contribute to the
perpetuation of peer rejection. For example, Hymel (1986) found that rejected children acquire
social reputations that function as cognitive schemas biasing the reactions toward the rejected.
She showed that children interpret identical actions by liked and disliked peers in strikingly
different ways. Whereas liked peers were given the benefit of doubt for negative actions,
disliked peers were perceived to have intentionally performed negative behaviors and were rarely
credited for positive actions (see also Hymel, Wagner, & Butler, 1990 for a review). Such
expectations or what Hymel calls “affective biases” make it more likely that the same children
continue to get excluded and ostracized. Taken together, Rabiner and Coie’s and Hymel and
colleagues’ findings suggest that social cognitive processes of both the rejected and rejectors
may conspire to perpetuate a child’s status as outcast.
The Moderating Effects of Social Context
If both social and individual factors moderate the stability of rejection, might they also
moderate the effects of rejection? Developmental researchers have begun to examine a variety
of social moderators of the impact of rejection and bullying on feelings of distress. For example,
having even just one friend appears to mitigate at least some social pain of peer victimization:
bullied youth with a friend tend to display lower levels of distress than those who are victimized
and friendless (Hodges, Malone, & Perry, 1997; Hodges, Boivin, Vitaro, & Bukowski, 1999). A
longitudinal study of Canadian third- through seventh-graders by Hodges et al. (1999)
demonstrated that children who experienced bullying but had a friend reported neither elevated
behavioral problems nor increased distress. In contrast, the behavioral problems of bullied
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children with no protective friendships worsened over time.
Our recent research on daily encounters with bullying illustrates more subtle social
moderators of children’s responses to victimization (Nishina & Juvonen, 2003). We proposed
that youth interpret their experience of being bullied not in a social vacuum but in comparison to
others. Hence, in addition to obtaining data on personal experiences of bullying, we also asked
youth to describe bullying incidents that happened to others. We then examined fluctuations in
daily affect (humiliation, anxiety) among young teens as a function of their reported incidents of
bullying. As expected, we found that witnessing others being bullied ameliorated some of the
acute effects of being bullied oneself. On days when youth reported both experiencing and
witnessing bullying, their feelings of anxiety were increased, whereas their reports of humiliation
were reduced, compared to days when they experienced but did not witness bullying. Hence,
social comparison may simultaneously ease and exacerbate different manifestations of social
pain.
In our most recent work on bullying, we examined the moderating role of classroom
environment on the psychological responses of victims (Bellmore, Witkow, Graham, & Juvonen,
2003). Extending the person-group misfit hypothesis (e.g., Stormshak et al., 1999), we
hypothesized that victimization is most strongly associated with emotional and social pain when
the classroom is orderly as opposed to disorderly. In other words, the plights of victims are
worse when the local norms do not legitimize disruption and peer maltreatment (e.g., Leadbeater
et al., 2003). Indeed, we found that in disorderly classrooms, all students (bullied or not)
experienced relatively high levels of social anxiety, whereas in the orderly classrooms, it was
only bullied students who reported higher rates of social anxiety. Paradoxically, this may mean
that classroom environments that are most protective for the majority of students (i.e., when
The Rejected and The Bullied
20
bullying is rare) may be most risky for the few who do experience bullying.
Underlying Social Cognitive Processes
To better understand the moderating effects of social comparisons (e.g., witnessing
victimization) and contexts (e.g., classroom level of disorder), it is helpful to examine the social
cognitive processes that may be involved in these episodes. That is, how do victims of bullying
construe their plights? Our research shows that compared to their non-bullied peers, youth who
view themselves as frequently bullied are more likely to blame themselves for incidents of peer
intimidation (Graham & Juvonen, 2000). Furthermore, our research shows that characterological
self-blame partly mediates the relation between self-perceived victim status and emotional
distress (i.e., social anxiety and loneliness). In light of our findings regarding classroom social
context and on witnessing others being bullied, we suspect that youth are most likely to blame
themselves when there is little bullying in their classroom and when they do not notice others
being bullied. Furthermore, we presume that such self-blaming tendencies account in part for
bullied children’s reported distress and depression.
Research on children’s self-perceptions or their awareness of their plight further helps us
understand the rejection –rejection linkage. Research by Panak & Garber (1992) has shown that
sociometrically rejected children (i.e., those whose peers avoid or dislike them) who were aware
of their low status were more depressed than sociometrically rejected children who were
unaware of their low status. Consistent with these findings, our research research also suggests
that children who view themselves as victimized but without a victim reputation (“paranoids”)
are more likely to feel lonely, socially anxious, and have lower self-esteem than others (including
those who have a reputation of a victim but who do not perceive themselves as victimized;
Graham & Juvonen, 2000; Graham, Bellmore & Juvonen, 2003). Hence, self-perceptions of
The Rejected and The Bullied
21
one’s social plight are critical in determining whether rejected youth experience social distress.
Immunity from Social Pain: The Case of Aggressive Outcasts
Social-cognitive processes may advance our understanding of not only what accounts for
the social pain experienced by rejected youth, but also why aggressive children appear not to be
hurt by peer rejection. It is to this distinctive subgroup of social outcasts that we now turn. The
case of aggressive children and adolescents is of theoretical interest and practical concern, given
that unlike most rejected children (and withdrawn-rejected children in particular), aggressiverejected children and adolescents do not report social pain following rejection (e.g., Parkhurst &
Asher, 1992; Renshaw & Brown, 1993). This finding implies that the group function of rejection
might not “work” for aggressive youth, although evidence from longitudinal studies suggests that
aggressive children are at risk for subsequent maladaptive functioning, albeit in the form of
criminality rather than internalizing problems (e.g., Kupersmidt & Coie, 1990; Tremblay, Masse,
Vitaro, & Dobkin, 1995).
A number of explanations have been advanced to account for the absence of direct
adverse psychological effects of peer rejection on aggressive children and adolescents. One set of
explanations receiving considerable attention is that aggressive-rejected youth display a variety
of self-protective (although often interpersonally problematic) social cognitive biases. Numerous
studies have documented aggressive children and adolescents’ tendencies to display self-serving
biases in evaluations of their own competencies and in their responsibility (or lack thereof) for
problematic peer experiences (Dodge & Crick, 1990; Orobio de Castro, Veerman, Koops, Bosch,
& Monshouwer, 2002; White et al., 2002). In a recent meta-analysis of research on aggressive
behavior and hostile attributions, Orobio de Castro and colleagues (2002) found strong evidence
for the tendency of aggressive children to perceive a peer’s ambiguously threatening behavior as
The Rejected and The Bullied
22
intentionally provocative. This attributional bias may help to explain the aggressive child’s lack
of emotional distress, inasmuch as blame directed at others is associated with anger and hostility
(see Weiner, 1995) rather than with social anxiety or depression (Graham, Hudley, & Williams,
1992).
Other types of biases in social information processing may also account for the lack of
distress following peer rejection. Schippell, Vasey, Cravens-Brown and Bretveld (2003)
identified attentional biases among adolescents identified as reactively aggressive: such youth
displayed suppressed attention to rejection, ridicule and failure cues. Hence, the apparent
protection enjoyed by aggressive-rejected youth may be in part explained by individual
differences in social cognitive processing, including but not limited to attributional and
attentional biases (see Dodge & Crick, 1990, for a discussion of additional processing biases and
deficiencies in aggressive youth).
Given our chief concern in the present review is to examine the role of the peer group in
the individual’s experience of rejection, we now move from the well-charted realm of individual
difference explanations to more recent explorations of social-contextual factors that may protect
the feelings of aggressive youth. The first social contextual explanation we address is rooted in
the fact that a peer rating of rejection is an indicator of peer sentiment, but not necessarily peer
treatment of the individual. The harsh treatment and ostracism one would expect disliked
individuals to experience may be reserved for targets not expected to retaliate. A rejected child’s
aggressiveness appears to be a critical factor in the degree to which he or she receives negative
peer feedback regarding his or her unacceptable behavior. When 10- to 13-year-old children of
differing sociometric status documented their acute, everyday peer experiences (Sandstrom &
Cillessen, 2003), peer rejection, withdrawal and aggression each predicted more frequent daily
The Rejected and The Bullied
23
negative peer experiences. However, withdrawn-rejected boys were significantly more likely
than their aggressive-rejected counterparts to report negative peer treatment. According to
Sandstrom and Cillessen, the peer context experienced by aggressive-rejected children may be a
“kinder” one than might be expected on the basis of their sociometric status. If peer rejection
serves to enforce group norms regarding interpersonal behavior, then the absence of negative,
rejecting behaviors from peers toward aggressive children may constitute a breakdown of the
norm enforcement process. The absence of negative feedback from peers may protect
aggressive-rejected children from social distress but at the same time, they may also have little
impetus to modify their behavior.
Another protective factor in aggressive-rejected children’s social experience has been
observed upon closer examination of their peer relationships. Recall that peer rejection is a
measure of consensus of the general peer collective; the rejected individual may still experience
belonging and social validation of their behavior by other deviant peers. Patterson, Capaldi and
Bank (1991) suggested that rejection limits aggressive children’s options for healthy peer
relationships, permitting them only to associate with and befriend similarly aggressive and
rejected peers.
Several studies of aggressive children’s friendships and social networks demonstrate the
compensatory social functions of deviant friends. Cairns, Cairns, Neckerman, Gest, and Gariepy
(1988) reported that aggressive fourth graders and seventh graders were no less likely than their
non-aggressive peers to be socially connected. They were equally likely to be nominated as a
best friend, to have reciprocal friendships, and to be perceived as a central member of a social
cluster. An analysis of the aggressive children’s peers indicated, however, that they were also
likely to be aggressive. These patterns have been observed in more recent research as well (e.g.,
The Rejected and The Bullied
24
Bagwell, Coie, Terry, & Lochman, 2000). Moreover, affiliation among deviant peers is known to
facilitate “deviance training,” whereby anti-social youth encourage one another’s problematic
behavior (Dishion, Spracklen, Andrews, & Patterson, 1996). It is therefore not surprising that
anti-social (including aggressive) youth who repeatedly affiliate with similar others are at greater
risk for subsequent criminal behavior (Dishion, McCord, & Poulin, 1999).
As indicated earlier, research documents that aggressive youth and bullies are not only
socially connected, but also enjoy popularity within their social networks (Juvonen, Graham &
Schuster, 2003; Luthar & McMahon, 1996; Parkhurst & Hopmeyer, 1998; Rodkin, Farmer,
Pearl, & Van Acken, 2000). For example, Juvonen et al. (2003) found that early adolescent
groups identified as bullies based on peer nominations (of physical, verbal, and relational
aggression) were considered “cooler” than other groups, including groups identified as socially
well-adjusted. Although bullies were popular, they were also moderately rejected.
At this point, we do not know whether teen bullies are rejected and perceived as “cool”
by the same or different individuals. Given the work of Patterson and colleagues (1991), bullies’
rejected status may reflect the views of non-deviant peers, whereas their high social status may
reflect the views of similarly aggressive individuals. Experimental work by White, Rubin and
Graczyk (2002) provides support for this account. In their research, aggressive children and
adolescents were less likely than their withdrawn and non-deviant peers to report negative affect
toward or exclude an aggressive peer.
It is also possible, however, that the same individuals who avoid the company of bullies
may also view them as “cool.” In that case, coolness might indicate being a bully is a successful
strategy to exert dominance. As argued by Hogg (in this volume), group leaders are not
necessarily prototypical and “deviates” are often highly functional leaders who further engage in
The Rejected and The Bullied
25
strategic marginalization of others. Hence, aggressive youth initially rejected from the normative
(non-aggressive) peer group might nevertheless ultimately exert considerable leadership within
the normative group because they are unaffected by the avoidance or dislike of their peers. This
possibility is especially likely in adolescence. As discussed earlier, adolescence represents a
unique phase in the lifespan in which aggressive and even criminal deviance elevates one’s
social status (Moffitt, 1993). The question of why this occurs remains to be further investigated.
Finally, we want to return to the question posed in the beginning of this chapter regarding
school shooters who were allegedly bullied and rejected by their peers. The evidence reviewed
thus far does not suggest that rejected children or victims of bullying lash out at their tormentors.
Nor does our review imply that aggression results from rejection or bullying experiences.
However, there is a growing body of research on yet another special group: aggressive or
provocative victims (Olweus, 1993, 1993; Perry, Kusel, & Perry, 1988).
This particular group of bully-victims shows a distinct profile of difficulties in school
functioning and social-emotional problems. For example, Juvonen et al. (2003) found that
among all identifiable sociometric groups, aggressive victims were rated by their teachers as
most disruptive and disengaged from school. They were also by far the most rejected among
peers, and showed somewhat elevated signs of emotional distress. Hence, they seemed to have
the worst of both worlds: all the problems and little of the immunity.
In their review of the existing research on aggressive victims, Schwartz, Proctor and
Chien (2001) suggest that the particular behavioral profile of aggressive victims may be
indicative of other underlying problems, such as emotion regulation problems typical of
hyperactive children who have attention deficit disorders. Hence, the fact these youth are
rejected by the group not only signals that they are deviant or that they do not fit in, but that there
The Rejected and The Bullied
26
is an underlying problem that can explain their reactions to rejection and bullying experiences.
This portrayal is probably most consistent with the depiction of the alleged school shooters in a
recent federal report (Vossekuil, Fein, Reddy, Borum, & Modzeleski, 2002). This in-depth case
analysis suggests that most of these young males displayed signs of aggression or violent
ideation and two-thirds of them had been bullied or rejected by their peers. In addition, in most
cases, the final impetus for the violent act involved a social failure, such as a rejection
experience. Hence, the combination of aggressive tendencies and aversive social experiences
appears to be especially volatile and problematic.
Lessons Learned
The critical issue in the case of rejected and bullied children is how repeated and aversive
social experiences affect development. We began this paper by suggesting that repeated
rejection and bullying experiences deprive children of normative peer interaction opportunities
that adversely affect their development. To summarize some of the critical mediating
mechanisms discussed above that might explain the links between rejection and subsequent
adjustment, we now propose a general model of rejection that includes both person-level and
group-level mediating mechanisms in Figure 1.
Consistent with the present review, we propose that rejection is initially triggered by a
lack of fit between the child and the group (path # 1). The subsequent processes involve both the
target (the individual child) and source (the normative peer group) of the initial rejection. The
upper section of path model depicts the personal or intrapsychological processes following the
experiences of rejection, where as the lower part depicts the group level processes that capture
the thoughts and actions of the rejectors.
The Rejected and The Bullied
27
Consistent with social-cognitive or information processing models (e.g., Dodge & Crick,
1990; Crick & Dodge, 1999), we propose that rejection elicits negative expectancies and socialcognitive (attentional as well as attributional) biases in both the rejected and their rejectors.
These social-cognitive biases in turn account for the subsequent behavioral reactions. Focusing
first on the lower level of the figure, rejected children acquire social reputations that function as
cognitive schemas biasing the reactions against the rejected (path # 2). The best demonstrations
of such biases was provided by Hymel (1986) who showed how children interpret the identical
actions by liked and disliked peers in strikingly different ways. Such affective biases then in turn
make it more likely that these same children continue to get excluded and ostracized (path # 3).
At the person or intrapsychological level, rejection experiences can foster different type
of social-cognitive biases (path # 4) depending on individual differences that promote the very
behaviors that elicited rejection in the first place. In the case of most children, and submissive
and socially withdrawn children in particular, tendency to blame oneself, specifically
characterological self-blame, increases feelings of depression, anxiety, and depression, which in
turn promote avoidance or withdrawal from peer interactions. In the case of aggressive children,
inferences of hostile intent of the actions by others further promote their anger and retaliation.
Hence, the social-cognitive biases are likely to promote the very behavior patterns (e.g., social
withdrawal and aggression) that elicited the rejection in the first place (path # 5). As depicted in
Figure 1, we propose that such perceptions mediate the relation between the initial eliciting
behavior and accentuation of these same behavior patterns.
Research on the experimental manipulation of interpersonal expectations of rejected
children (Rabiner & Coie, 1989) suggest that negative expectations might also maintain their
rejected status. This pathway is not necessarily mediated by changes in overt behaviors,
The Rejected and The Bullied
28
inasmuch as Rabiner and Coie could not detect any behavioral indicators of improved social
status when rejected youth were led to believe that others liked them. (Alternatively, they may
be very subtle behaviors that they are difficult to detect.) Nevertheless, in light of the available
data, we propose that the person-level construct tapping expectations predicts group-level
processes by increasing the chances that peers reject the target repeatedly (path # 6).
Repeated rejection on the part of the peer group, in turn, is likely to accentuate the initial
behavioral responses that elicited rejection in the first place. However, such a pathway is likely
to be bi-directional (path # 7), inasmuch as increased social withdrawal and aggression in turn
are associated with prolonged experiences of rejection. Repeated rejection by normative peer
group, in turn, restricts children’s opportunities for normative peer interactions (path # 8). Also,
accentuated eliciting behaviors are bidirectionally linked to restricted opportunities to affiliate
with normative peer group (path # 9). We reviewed evidence showing how increased
withdrawal means that children end up playing alone and ceasing to interact therefore restricting
their opportunities to engage in normative peer interactions. In the case of aggressive youth, we
documented that their opportunities are restricted in the sense that they seek the company of
other aggressive children. Such affiliations are likely to promote “deviance training” (Dishion,
et a., 1996) among the aggressive youth that is likely to result in increased behavior problems
(Dishion et al., 1999).
Restricted opportunities to affiliate with the normative peer group result in lack of “social
practice” for the rejected children (path # 10), which in turn predicts maladaptive functioning of
these youth (path #11). In the case of socially withdrawn youth, they are at risk for internalizing
problems, such as depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem, whereas aggressive youth are at risk
for antisocial behaviors (McDougall et al., 2001).
The Rejected and The Bullied
In summary, the proposed developmental model depicts an array of interpersonal and
intrapersonal processes that appear to conspire to propel the social outcast toward increased
deviance and maladaptive functioning among normative peers, although not necessarily away
from all relationships. Our goal was to present a general model that applies to most rejected or
bullied children, regardless of individual differences that have received the most attention in
developmental research. Finally, the set of predictions and associations depicted in this model
reflect our review of the literature. Thus, it is possible that other set of linkages and more
complex relations can added to this basic model. How can such a model or the developmental
research in general then help us understand some of the issues currently debated among social
psychologists?
Contributions of the Developmental to the Social Research
To be added in response to other chapters in the volume.
29
The Rejected and The Bullied
30
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Appendix
Our review was based on the 145 studies published between 1993 and 2003 in Child
Development, Developmental Psychology, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin that were found in a PsycINFO search on the
following six keywords: rejection, ostracism, exclusion, harassment, victimization and bullying.
Each of thirteen characteristics were coded independent of the others; that is, an article could
include both experimental and non-experimental data, or rejection by both strangers and familiar
others.
Table 1A. Comparison of Characteristics of Social and Developmental Investigations, 1993-2003
% of
Articles in
Developmental
Psychology Journals
(n = 74)
% of
Articles
in Social
Psychology Journals
(n = 71)
χ2
89%
26%
45%
75%
29.56**
36.76**
78%
19%
1%
18%
51%
18%
52.32**
16.20**
12.33**
12%
44%
16.24**
Source of Rejection
Strangers
Familiar others
Individual
Group
4%
96%
16%
89%
48%
55%
73%
34%
33.81**
33.29**‡
52.59**‡
47.38**‡
Research Design
Experimental
Non-experimental
Longitudinal
20%
81%
45%
62%
49%
21%
26.11**
16.20**
8.89*
Characteristic
Chronicity of Rejection
Chronic
Discrete
Determination of Rejected Status
Other-report
Self-report
Rejection involving no direct
interpersonal interaction with source
Experimental manipulation or
behavioral coding only
Notes: Unless otherwise noted, χ2 statistics reflect Fisher’s Exact test comparing articles with
and without each characteristic in the two fields; comparisons that include a third category
“unspecified,” used a standard two-tailed χ2 test, and are noted by “‡”; * = p <.01; ** = p < .001.
The Rejected and The Bullied
Figure Caption
Figure 1. Proposed developmental model of intrapersonal and interpersonal consequences of
peer rejection.
43
The Rejected and The Bullied
44
PERSON-LEVEL
PROCESSES
Negative
Expectancies
&
Attributional
Biases
4
5
Accentuation
of Eliciting
Behaviors
Lack of
social
“practice”
1
Lack of
PersonGroup Fit
6
Peer
Rejection
2
GROUP-LEVEL
PROCESSES
Negative
Reputation
Among
Peers:
Expectancies
& Biases
7
3
9
Repeated
Rejection
Across
Situations
8
10
Restricted
Affiliation
with
Normative
Peer Group
11
Maladaptive
Functioning