What Could Have Been: Predicted and Actual Exclusion by Potential Romantic Partners and Platonic Friends

ABSTRACT Romantic partners are instrumental to more goals than friends, and therefore, people have more to lose when denied a romantic relationship than a friendship. We explored people's forecasted and experienced rejection by a potential romantic partner or friend. In Study 1, participants ( N = 1500) reported their lay beliefs about which experience would hurt more. Twice as many people indicated that potential romantic (vs. friend) rejection would be worse. In Studies 2 and 3, participants ( N = 934, 477 respectively) were accepted or rejected by potential romantic partners or friends. The source of the exclusion did not impact participants’ forecasted or experienced affect or needs satisfaction. However, participants overestimated the pain of exclusion. Despite believing romantic rejection would hurt more when directly comparing it to platonic rejection and forecasting an exaggeration of this hurt, exclusion appears universally painful, and the potential relationship between the source and target matters little.