Social Exclusion Enhances Affiliative Signalling

Reciprocating others’ smiles is important for maintaining social connections as it both signals affiliative to others and also elicits affiliative reactions from others. Feelings of social exclusion may increase affiliative mimicry to improve affiliative bonds with others. In this study we examined whether social exclusion leads people to selectively mimic the facial expressions of more affiliative-looking smiles. Participants (N=48) first wrote about either a time they were excluded or a neutral event. They then classified a series of 20 smiling faces–half spontaneous enjoyment smiles and half posed smiles. Facial electromyography recorded muscle activity involved in smiling. Excluded participants distinguished the two smile types better than controls. Excluded participants also showed greater zygomaticus major (mouth smiling) activity toward enjoyment smiles compared to posed smiled; control participants did not. Orbicularis oculi (eye crinkle) activity matched that of the smile type viewed, but did not vary by exclusion condition. Affiliative social regulation is discussed as a possible explanation for these effects.