Implications of rejection sensitivity for intimate relationships

“In thinking about the relationship between perceptions that condoms interfere with intimacy and GRS, we drew upon rejection sensitivity theory (Downey and Feldman, 1996; Pachankis, 2007; Pachankis et al., 2008).”

“Rejection sensitivity is significantly predictive of relationship dissatisfaction (Downey & Feldman, 1996) and of relationship dissolution (Downey et al.) for men and women.”

“Rejection sensitivity has been described as a symptom of atypical depression, is increasingly being explored,(40) and a Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire has been developed.(41) Panksepp(42) has.”

“The 8-item Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (Downey & Feldman, 1996) measures anxious expectation of rejection across situations in which participants imagine themselves making requests of others.”

“The RSQ has high internal and test–retest reliability (Downey & Feldman, 1996; a = .84, in the present sample).”

“Fourth, the RSS was administered after participants performed the RS on-line task, but before the RS off-line task, that may have temporarily altered their responses on the RSS.”

“Rejection sensitivity refers to the disposition to defensively or anxiously expect, readily perceive, and intensely react to situations where rejection is possible.(10) Essentially, a person with high rejection sensitivity is constantly anticipating rejection, and he or she likely has a low threshold for identifying w…”

“the college student RSQ from which it was adapted (Downey and Feldman 1996), the adult version presents nine hypothetical interpersonal situations involving possi-”

“As psychometric studies have indicated a stable one-factor structure, an overall RS score is calculated as the average anxious expectation ratings across the 18 situations (see Downey & Feldman, 1996 for details of psychometric properties).”

“Rejection sensitivity, as a similar sensitivity construct, refers to individual differences in the tendency to expect, perceive, and react to alleged or actual cues of rejection in the social environment [11].”

“Researchers have reported that perceived rejection is associated with poorer psychological health outcomes, especially when rejection occurs in intimate partner contexts (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Nolan, Flynn, & Garber, 2003).”

“Moreover, although social avoidance may lessen the sting of potential negative evaluations (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Murray, Holmes, & Collins, 2006), it also clearly undermines lonely individuals’ desire for social connection.”

“Some people, particularly those who are rejection-sensitive, may avoid approaching an attractive dating prospect to protect the self from emotional pain ( Downey & Feldman, 1996 ).”

“By eliciting stereotype-consistent behaviours in older individuals which in turn might evoke (more) ageist responses from others, views on ageing can act as self-fulfilling prophecies (Downey and Feldman 1996).”

“Ratings were multiplied because we were interested in the interaction between anxious concerns and expectations, in the same way that Downey and Feldman (1996) calculated Personal-RS scores in previous 604 L.”

“Participants completed a computerized battery of personality questionnaires that included scales relevant to self-regulation and social rejection: the Conscientiousness subscale of the Big Five Inventory (John et al., 1991, 2008), the Brief Self Control Scale (Tangney et al., 2004), the Rejection Sensitivity Questionn…”

“Higher RSQ scores have been associated with detrimental consequences for relationships, such as general dissatisfaction and even dissolution (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Downey, Freitas, Michaelis, & Khouri, 1998).”

“The Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (Downey & Feldman, 1996) assesses anxious expectations of rejection from close others.”

“An athlete who is “rejection sensitive” ( Downey & Feldman, 1996 ) construes the feedback as a signal that she is being rejected by the coach and becomes depressed.”

“Interpersonal rejection sensitivity was measured using the short version of the interpersonal rejection sensitive scale (RSQ-personal; Downey & Feldman, 1996).”

“Additionally, individuals high in rejection sensitivity (Downey and Feldman, 1996) may have lower expectations for perceived relational evaluation because they presume social interactions will not likely be positive.”

“Continuing with the topic at hand, rejection can be produced and studied in the laboratory by psychologists (e.g., Downey and Feldman, 1996; Ayduk et al., 2003).”

“…and rejection sensitivity, including the Body Dysmorphic Disorder-Symptom Scale (BDD-SS), Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS; Liebowitz, 1987), and Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ; Downey & Feldman, 1996), were administered as part of a larger battery of selfreport questionnaires.”

“…that included the 16-item Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI; Ames, Rose, & Anderson, 2006), the 12-item Experiences in Close Relationships–Revised scale (ECR; Wei, Russell, Mallinckrodt, & Vogel, 2007), and the eight-item Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ; Downey & Feldman, 1996).”

“For example, people with high rejection sensitivity show less activation of the rVLPFC during social exclusion relative to people with low rejection sensitivity (Kross et al, 2007 ), and they show characteristic heightened reactivity to rejection cues and subsequent personal and interpersonal difficulties (eg, relatio…”

“Future researchers need to address whether the reduced intimacy experienced by cultural chameleons and individuals with low public CSE is an adaptive response to dealing with actual discrimination from their interaction partner or if instead these individuals are being rejection sensitive, that is, anxiously anticipat…”

“…1995), Brookings, Zembar, and Hochstetler (2003) found that college students who scored high on the Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ; Downey & Feldman, 1996) also CONTACT Nicole M. Cain nicole.cain@liu.edu Department of Psychology, Long Island University–Brooklyn, 1 University…”

“Given that adolescents vary in terms of both their neural sensitivity to peer rejection and their subjective sensitivity to peer rejection (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Masten et al., 2009), we examined how neural activity during observed peer acceptance versus rejection related to two different indices…”

“In a study of close relationships, Downey and Feldman (1996) found that the cognitive-affective process of sensitivity to rejection could add a great amount of stress to romantic relationships and undermine them. In another study, Nezlek et al. (1997) found that people with high vulnerability to social rejection react…”

“…and ADHD may also affect relational adjustment; for instance, high rejection sensitivity (RS; misinterpreting, overreacting to social cues; Downey & Feldman, 1996) has been positively associated with romantic success in college males with ADHD-C, converse to the trend in ADHD-IA and ND…”

“…(Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007), to low self-esteem individuals (Leary, Tambor, Terdal, & Downs, 1995), and/or to rejection-sensitive individuals (Downey & Feldman, 1996) because such individuals may not trust others sufficiently for the mechanisms we suggest cause our observed effects to kick…”

“Our findings regarding the rejection endorsement bias are consistent with the definition of RS and with the initial findings of Downey and Feldman (1996) whereby individuals high in RS tend to attribute rejection to the self, both in hypothetical and in reallife situations.”

“We randomly selected 6 of each type of RS dyad, in which members scored in the top or bottom of the distribution (using RS SD=3.5; Downey & Feldman, 1996).”

“…studies have found RS, which correlates highly with anxiety, to be associated in adult women with elevated anger following conflicts with significant others, as well as an increased tendency toward hostility and withdrawal of emotional support from intimate partners (Downey & Feldman, 1996).”

“Based on Bowlby’s theory and the conducted researches in this field, parents who react to their children’s needs in a rejecting way raise children who are sensitive to rejection (Feldman & Downey, 1994; Downey & Feldman, 1996; Pachankis, Goldfried, & Ramrattan, 2008).”

“Individual differences in rejection sensitivity (Downey & Feldman, 1996), attachment insecurity (Zhou & Gao, 2008), and social anxiety (Mallott, Maner, DeWall, & Schmidt, 2009; Maner et al., 2007; Oaten et al., 2008) are also linked to negative responses to social exclusion.”

“People with low self-esteem tend to believe that others’ acceptance depends on their living up to certain standards (Baldwin, 1997; Baldwin & Sinclair, 1996; Downey & Feldman, 1996; Roberts, Gotlib, & Kassel, 1996).”

“High levels of rejection sensitivity are associated with many problems, including problems with relationships (Downey & Feldman, 1996), distress, and psychopathology.”

“This could be even worse for the anxious, who are acutely sensitive to rejection (Downey & Feldman, 1996) and have chronic negative expectations about future relationships (Carnelley & Janoff-Bulman, 1992; Whitaker, Beach, Etherton, Wakefield, & Anderson, 1999); they cannot inhibit thoughts of…”

“…they may carry anxious expectations of rejection into new situations and relationships and readily perceive and overreact to signs of rejection (Downey & Feldman, 1996); these overreactions, in turn, may elicit further rejection by others and reinforce anxious expectations of rejection…”

“Rejection sensitivity influences cognition, perception, self-regulation, emotion, motivation, and performance (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Kaiser & Kaplan, 2006; Pickett et al., 2004) and, due to the frequency of rejection in academia, the potential for developing rejection sensitivity is high (Day,…”

“One study found that personal rejection sensitivity as assessed by the Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (Downey & Feldman, 1996) partially mediated the relationship between social anxiety symptoms and body dysmorphic concerns in sample of undergraduates (Fang, Asnaani, Gutner, Cook, Wilhelm, & Hofmann, 2011).”

“When parents often discuss the ethnic background of their children, this may raise the awareness of the adolescents for the presence of rejection cues because of one’s ethnic background (Downey and Feldman 1996; Mendoza-Denton et al. 2002).”

“An important aspect of the RS model is that individuals respond to real or imagined threats of rejection with cognitive-affective and behavioral overreactions, such as anger, hostility, and controlling behavior (Downey & Feldman, 1996; Downey et al., 1997; Galliher & Bentley, this issue).”

“Surveys showed that the internal consistency (alpha) and test-retest reliability of RSQ are high, being 0.81 and 0.83 respectively (Downey and Feldman, 1996).”

“Indeed, rejection-sensitive individuals and their romantic partners have been found to experience greater dissatisfaction in their relationship (Downey and Feldman, 1996) and are more likely to experience the dissolution of their relationship (Downey et al., 1998).”

“…sensitivity is defined as the individual tendency to anxiously expect, readily perceive, and overreact to rejection (Downey et al., 1998a, b; Downey & Feldman, 1996), which was found to have negative effects on individuals’ social cognition, emotion, and behaviors in interpersonal…”

“For example, rejection-sensitive individuals give more weight to cues that indicate rejection but not to cues that indicate acceptance (Downey & Feldman, 1996).”

“RSQ).”