peer rejection
Being pushed away
Peer rejection is the experience of being excluded, ostracized, or actively disliked by one's social equals—classmates, coworkers, or others in the same age or status group.
The term appears most often in developmental psychology discussing children and adolescents: Peer rejection in middle school can have lasting effects on self-esteem.
Unlike simple unpopularity, peer rejection implies active exclusion rather than mere indifference.
- ostracismBanishment from a group
- silent treatmentRefusing to speak
- exclusionBeing barred from participation
- lonelinessState of lacking companions
- outcastShunned, rejected person
social outcast · isolation · bullying · shunned · cold shoulder · ignored · cliques · lunchroom · eating alone · playground · whispers · coldness · invisible · humiliation · acceptance · left out · left behind · odd one out
- alienationestrangement, social isolation, disconnection, exclusion, outsider
- adolescencepuberty, teenager, coming-of-age, growing up, teen
- behavior problemsaggression, defiance, tantrums, bullying, hitting
- depressionmajor depression, clinical depression, sadness, hopelessness, anhedonia
- childhood traumaabuse, neglect, emotional abuse, physical abuse, ACEs
- emotional neglectneglect, emotional neglect, emotional unavailability, emotional deprivation, emotional distance
peer rejectionpeer acceptance
Approval from one's equals
social acceptance · belonging · inclusion · social inclusion · fitting in
peer rejectionsocial bonding
Forming emotional connections
peer support · friendship · camaraderie · companionship · fellowship
peer, rejection, peers, peered, peering, peerage, peerless, reject, rejects