Cyberball

Cyberball is a computer-mediated experimental paradigm used to study ostracism and social exclusion in laboratory settings. In the basic version, a participant believes they are playing a ball-tossing game with two other players who are computer-controlled or acted by confederates. The game proceeds with the ball being passed among the players for a short period, after which the participant is either included in the throws or excluded. In the exclusion condition, the other players suddenly stop throwing the ball to the participant, effectively ostracizing the player.

Cyberball is designed to induce feelings of social exclusion and to examine their emotional and cognitive consequences. Researchers collect self-report measures of mood, belonging, self-esteem, and perceived control, and may record neural or physiological data (e.g., fMRI, EEG, skin conductance) to study brain mechanisms of social pain, often noting activity in regions like the anterior cingulate cortex and anterior insula.

The paradigm was developed by Kipling D. Williams and colleagues in the late 1990s/early 2000s as a controlled tool to manipulate ostracism while minimizing harm. It has since been widely used across psychology and neuroscience to study the effects of social rejection on motivation, emotion, and behavior. Numerous variants exist, including different numbers of players and manipulation of social context. The procedure relies on deception about other players; participants are debriefed afterwards, and studies follow ethical guidelines to minimize distress.