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Teenagers often try to be part of groups they admire by dressing in certain ways, by listening to certain music, or even by engaging in damaging behaviors like smoking, drinking or drug abuse. Later in life, people may work equally hard to be included, whether it is at social gatherings, by colleagues at work, or by other moms at the local playground. In other words, our own behavior is often of fundamental importance for attaining inclusion. This doesn’t mean that others don’t play an important role in ensuring we are included. They do: when people invite us to a birthday they include us; when we are not welcome they exclude us. However, sometimes our own behavior is more important for ensuring inclusion, and other times other people’s behavior is more important. The outcome may be the same in both cases–you end up included or alone–but the route is very different. The question then is, does this matter?

We investigated this question in two studies recently published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin (De Waal-Andrews & Van Beest, 2012). If people are prepared to go to great lengths to be included, we asked, does that mean that people also enjoy inclusion more when they “claim” it for themselves? Or will they enjoy it less, because inclusion that is “granted” by others is somehow valued more? We predicted the latter.