Rejection Sensitivity

The RS Measure

RS has a long history in psychodynamic psychiatry. Downey and colleagues describe rejection sensitivity in social-cognitive terms (i.e., in terms of the thoughts and emotions experienced in situations whether acceptance or rejection from someone important is possible). The Rejection Sensitivity Questionnaire (RSQ) measures individual differences in the level of threat that people experience in such situations. The RSQ presents a series of hypothetical situations in which people make a request of someone important to them (e.g., “You ask a friend to do a big favor”). Respondents then indicate their level of both (a) expectations of rejection (e.g., “I would [not] expect that he/she would want to do the favor”), and (b) concern or anxiety about the outcome (e.g., “How concerned or anxious would you be over whether or not your friend would want to do the favor?”). RS scores are calculated by multiplying the level of expectation of rejection by the level of anxiety/concern about it and then averaging those multiplied values across [Page 1340]the situations. Someone deemed high in RS consistently expects rejection and feels anxious about the possibility of its occurrence. In contrast, someone deemed low in RS calmly expects acceptance. Because the particular situations that elicit rejection concerns vary by developmental stage, appropriate RSQs have been developed and validated for children, college-age students, and adults.