The role of gender and safety concerns in romantic rejection decisions

Considerable research has examined how people feel when interpersonally rejected. Less attention has been paid to the rejectors, especially on how they reject. Rejection methods can range from direct (i.e., informing the target) to indirect (i.e., ghosting), and the method and motives regarding rejection strategies are important because rejected targets often react negatively to rejection, sometimes even violently. It is imperative, therefore, to understand why people reject the way they do, especially when their rejections may yield unexpected negative consequences. A key factor that may influence rejection method decisions, particularly in the context of romantic rejections, is the gender of the target. Drawing on prior research indicating that men are perceived as more dangerous, in this registered report we hypothesized that bisexual individuals may be more likely to endorse ghosting if the target is a man, especially when safety concerns are made salient. A pilot study supported this hypothesis in a sample of mostly heterosexual individuals. The main study tested this hypothesis in a sample of bisexual individuals in order to manipulate target gender as a within-subjects variable and to better understand romantic rejection processes in an understudied sample. Overall, we found that safety concerns may make individuals more likely to engage in ghosting, but how that decision interacts with target gender was less clear.