My IBL presentation is about The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

The essential question I chose is “How does rejection by the majority of people around a person impact their mental state and overall demeanor?”. In other words, how does being rejected effect the way someone may act or think. Humans are social creatures so the consequences of being rejected can be very damaging to the human psyche.

For common knowledge, the word reject by dictionary definition is “(to) dismiss as inadequate, inappropriate, or not to one's taste”. In the article, “The Pain of Social Rejection” by Kirsten Weir, Weir describes rejection as something that can effect the brain in a way that triggers not only an emotional response but a physical pain response as well. These responses can affect the way a person thinks and acts.

Pain Response

To begin, when a person experiences rejection, this can increase activity in the part of the brain that registers pain. Usually the pain of rejection goes away but in extreme cases, such as a rejection of love, the pain may last for a long time

An example of this in the novel, The Scarlet Letter, is Dimmesdale who, upon hiding his secret for fear of rejection, experienced a chronic and nearly crippling pain.

This response can cause a person to become extremely moody or even fall into a depression

Emotional Response

Being rejected also triggers an emotional response such as anger or sadness. Some respond to social exclusion with rage, lashing out at those around them and sadly driving them to be even more excluded. Some respond with going into a depressive state of sadness wherein they push away emotions and become numb. These action can cause a person to change the way they act around other, often secluding themselves even more in the process and using other means to distract them from reality.

In The Scarlet Letter, the character Hester is shown to experience this when she is rejected by her town. She removes herself from others and moves to the edge of town, devoting herself to work and her daughter and wearing dreary clothing.

In conclusion, the consequences of a person being rejected can result in them adjusting their behavior and secluding themselves even more, pushing those they care about away. Thus further hurting their social interaction and sending them farther into a downward spiral.

Works Cited