Social exclusion's effect on psychological needs, sense of agency and moral cognition from an embodied cognition perspective

This study investigated the effects of social exclusion on fundamental psychological needs-namely, sense of belonging, self-esteem, existential meaning, and sense of control-as well as on the sense of agency, focusing on its two components: voluntariness and effort, along with moral decision making. A sample of 111 participants was recruited and exposed to an online ostracism task. Participants then completed measures assessing their psychological needs and sense of agency, and engaged in moral decision-making tasks based on Greene's five classic moral dilemmas (Wallet, Resume, Switch, Infidelity, and Sex). The results revealed that exclusion significantly reduced participants' sense of belonging, self-esteem, and existential meaning, as well as moral intensity judgment in the Switch scenario, but increased moral intensity in the Sex scenario. Exclusion had no significant effect on sense of control, either component of sense of agency, or the remaining moral scenarios. In line with the embodied cognition framework, bodily awareness was included as a covariate in the analysis. Interestingly, higher bodily awareness predicted greater satisfaction of psychological needs and lower feelings of involuntariness in agency. These findings highlight the relevance of embodied factors in shaping psychological needs and certain aspects of agency.