Can Rejection Damage Your Heart Health?

By Mary Kyle Blogger

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Reject - “a: to refuse to accept, consider, submit to, take for some purpose, or use.” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary).

The dictionary definition hardly does justice to the true meaning of rejection. Most of us have experienced that kicked-in-the-gut-I-can’t-breathe feeling at least once that comes when you realize that you’ve been left out or excluded from the rest of the group. There’s always one child who’s the last one to be chosen for the baseball team at recess, or never invited to birthday parties, or asked to the prom. It would be nice to say that such incidents are simply part of the rite of passage of childhood and that once we enter adulthood rejection becomes nothing more than a faint scar we carry as a badge of honor for surviving our childhood - nice but, unfortunately, not true. Rejection is a part of life and from time to time, whether adult or child, rejection continues to rear its ugly head and bite. Not only does rejection hurt our feelings, it may also be potentially damaging to your health, including your heart health.

It’s long been known that there is a connection between inflammation and the development of numerous diseases including heart disease, depression, asthma, some types of cancer, and arthritis, to name a few. Over the past few years, the role of “social stress” in the development of inflammation-related diseases has been under closer scrutiny by the medical profession. In a study conducted by the Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology at UCLA, researchers found a relationship between increased levels of inflammation markers in persons who’d just suffered rejection.

As a part of the study, 124 young adults were placed in situations designed to exert stress on the participant and make them feel rejected. For example, some participants were required to give a speech without preparation time or do complex math problems (without the aid of paper, pencils or the trusted calculator) in front of a not so friendly or supportive audience. A subset of 31 participants underwent a MRI while playing computer games where they were deliberately excluded or rejected by other players.

After participants were subjected to the stressors and social rejection, researchers tested the participants’ saliva for the presence of inflammation markers. Researchers found that all participants had increased levels of inflammation markers after they’d been placed in situations of social stress or rejection. The levels for the inflammation markers went up proportionately to the amount of stress the participant was subjected to during the test. In the subset of participants who were given an MRI during the rejection, researchers found that the “sad” and “distress” centers of the brain showed increased levels of activity.

Based on the results, researchers theorize that there is a neurocognitive link between inflammation and depression or social stress. I remember one student who became violently ill at school every Friday morning at 9:45 a.m. sharp: his math test was at 10:00 a.m. His dislike of math, fear of failing the test and ridicule from his peers produced a very real physiological response. The results really come as no surprise. If stress or rejection can make a child sick, why can’t it make adults sick as well? Perhaps one day science will find the biological reason for the connection but for most of us, it’s enough to know that stress, and feeling rejected, isn’t good for your health, or your heart, and should be avoided.

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Sources:
George M Slavich, Baldwin M. Way, Naomi I. Eisenberger, and Shelly E. Taylor, Neural sensitivity to social rejection is associated with inflammatory responses to social stress, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 25 Jun 2010, http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/07/26/1009164107.abstract

Shari Roan, Study suggests why sadness and sickness go hand-in-hand, Los Angeles Times, 03 Aug 2010, http://articles.latimes.com/2010/aug/03/news/la-heb-stress-20100803

Bill Hendrick, Rejection Affects Health: Inflammatory Response to Rejection May Damage Health, WebMD, 02 Aug 2010, https://www.webmdhealth.com/nl/nlv.aspx?id=gbfVprIjvCM=&s=20473

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We value and respect our HERWriters' experiences, but everyone is different. Many of our writers are speaking from personal experience, and what's worked for them may not work for you. Their articles are not a substitute for medical advice, although we hope you can gain knowledge from their insight.