Do emotional modulation induced by social rejection or social inclusion influences paranoia-like thoughts? The Autobiographical memory recall and Cyberball paradigms in two online studies

Feeling of vulnerability, as a response to a situation of social rejection, has been found to be closely related to the development of paranoia-like thoughts. To date, several studies have attempted to uncover the mechanisms behind the relationship between social rejection and paranoia-like thoughts. However, the role of negative emotions in this context is still not fully understood. In two experimental online studies, using two different paradigms - Cyberball and Autobiographical memory recall - we aimed to investigate the impact of social rejection on paranoia-like thoughts through negative emotions. The responses of 183 participants from Study 1 (77.6% females) and 456 participants from Study 2 (88.2% females) collected online via Internet were analysed. The results revealed that social rejection itself did not increase paranoia-like thoughts, but the relationship was indirect-only mediated by a change in negative emotions. Both paradigms have been found to be effective in inducing feelings of social rejection, but the Autobiographical memory recall paradigm has shown a greater effect in increasing negative emotions following social rejection than the Cyberball game did, which may be related to including more social or even personal context, i.e. one's own memories. Future studies using more ecologically valid methods are recommended