Why Rejection Hurts: The Neuroscience of Social Pain and the Path Toward Healing

Have you ever felt rejected, left out, or excluded—and noticed that it didn’t just affect your mood, but created a real, physical ache? That sensation isn’t just in your imagination. Research in neuroscience confirms that social pain—like rejection or isolation—activates the same brain areas as physical pain. In other words, the pain of being left out or disconnected is very real, and it’s deeply rooted in the way our brains are wired.

The Overlap Between Social and Physical Pain

Groundbreaking research by Naomi Eisenberger, Matthew Lieberman, and Kip Williams used brain imaging (fMRI) to explore how people respond to social exclusion. In one of their most well-known studies, participants played a virtual ball-tossing game called Cyberball. Some players were included, while others were deliberately excluded. For those who were left out, brain scans revealed increased activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC)—a region that’s also activated during experiences of physical pain.

The more emotional distress participants reported, the more active this pain-related brain region became (Eisenberger et al., 2003). What this means is that the brain doesn’t draw a sharp line between physical injuries and the pain of being left out. Instead, it processes both kinds of pain through overlapping neural systems.

Later studies, including Eisenberger’s 2012 review of the neuroscience of social pain, confirmed this overlap across various contexts. This growing body of research suggests that we are biologically wired to experience relational disconnection as threatening and painful. Our survival has long depended on our social bonds, so our brains developed mechanisms to alert us when those bonds were at risk.

We Are Designed for Connection

Human beings are relational by design. From birth, we rely on others to meet our needs, regulate our emotions, and help us make sense of the world. Our bodies are built for connection and we form relational bonds and attachment patterns through our attachment system. The natural opioid system in our brains, which helps reduce physical pain, is also involved in reinforcing social connection and attachment bonds. Alongside oxytocin, the body’s “bonding hormone,” this neurochemical system plays a key role in our ability to form and maintain attachment throughout our lives (MacDonald & Leary, 2005; Eisenberger, 2012).

That’s why rejection, abandonment, or exclusion can be so profoundly painful. It’s not a sign of weakness or oversensitivity—it’s a reflection of how much we are created for connection.

Social Pain and Protective Adaptations

When we experience attachment trauma, chronic rejection, abandonment, or other relational wounds, we naturally adapt to protect ourselves. These protective strategies—like emotional withdrawal, hyper-independence, people-pleasing, or shutting down—may have helped us survive painful circumstances. We form insecure attachment patterns to help us survive in suboptimal relational contexts. But over time, especially when we enter safe and healthy relationships, these same strategies can become barriers to connection.

Our nervous systems may still be on high alert, scanning for signs of danger or rejection even when none are present. These adaptations can interfere with our ability to trust, feel joy, or experience peace in relationships.

The Role of Counselling in Relational Healing

The good news is that we can repattern our relational responses. Because the brain is capable of change—a concept known as neuroplasticity—we can form new ways of connecting that are rooted in safety and trust, rather than survival and self-protection.

In counselling, this healing process might include:

• Experiencing relational safety in the therapeutic relationship, where you are seen, heard, and accepted

• Processing unresolved emotions from past relational pain—especially the emotions that were once too overwhelming or unsafe to feel

• Becoming aware of protective patterns, and learning new ways to stay present with your own emotional experience and that of others

When pain originates in relationship, healing often happens in relationship. Therapy can provide a safe space to explore what connection means to you, how past experiences have shaped your relational patterns, and how to move toward healthier, more fulfilling ways of being with others.

Faith, Pain, and Healing

For those who are Christian, this understanding of social pain resonates deeply with the spiritual truth that we were created for relationship—with God and with one another. Scripture does not minimize emotional pain—it acknowledges it and makes space for it. Jesus Himself experienced rejection, betrayal, and isolation. In Gethsemane, the place of His greatest anguish, He entered fully into the depth of human pain. This was no accident. It was a sign that He does not avoid our pain—He meets us in it.

Faith does not require us to deny our emotional reality. Rather, it invites us to bring our full experience—our grief, despair, anger, embarrassment, and sadness—into God’s presence. When we do, we often discover that pain can become a doorway to deeper intimacy with Him. Just as the Cross was not what people expected from a Savior, healing may not always look the way we imagine—but God’s love meets us in the middle of our pain and transforms it from the inside out.

You’re Not Alone

If you’ve experienced the pain of rejection, exclusion, or disconnection, know this: your response is real, your pain is valid, and healing is possible. Counselling is one way to begin restoring connection—with others, with yourself, and with God.

You were made for relationship. And you don’t have to navigate the path to healing alone.

References

Eisenberger, N. I. (2012). The neural bases of social pain: Evidence for shared representations with physical pain. Psychosomatic Medicine, 74(2), 126–135. https://doi.org/10.1097/PSY.0b013e3182464dd1

Eisenberger, N. I., & Lieberman, M. D. (2005). Why it hurts to be left out: The neurocognitive overlap between physical and social pain. In K. D. Williams, J. P. Forgas, & W. von Hippel (Eds.), The social outcast: Ostracism, social exclusion, rejection, and bullying (pp. 109–130). Psychology Press.

Eisenberger, N. I., Lieberman, M. D., & Williams, K. D. (2003). Does rejection hurt? An fMRI study of social exclusion. Science, 302(5643), 290–292. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1089134

MacDonald, G., & Leary, M. R. (2005). Why does social exclusion hurt? The relationship between social and physical pain. Psychological Bulletin, 131(2), 202–223. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.131.2.202