What Really Motivates the Ghoster?

The process of ghosting, or ending a relationship by vanishing, may seem to be the cruelest way to end things. If you’ve been a “ghostee,” you know how confusing this all can be. One day you’re texting back and forth constantly, and the next day, nothing. If you’re the “ghoster,” you might be doing this out of spite, or perhaps because you think this will be easier on your now ex-partner. Either way, there are many possible combinations of reasons and outcomes involved in this whole painful experience.

A New Theory of Ghosting

According to New York University’s YeJin Park and Nadav Klein (2024), ghosting is highly prevalent, not only in romantic relationships but also in professional relationships. A new employee may have an idea rejected by superiors without explanation, just as one example. Ghostees usually fault the ghoster for being uncaring and insensitive, a natural-enough reaction. However, Park and Klein believe that “ghosters ghost partly to avoid causing pain to ghostees, but this reality is lost on ghostees.”

The NYU authors believe that, as a form of rejection, ghosting has the unique quality of involving a “gap,” between both parties in figuring out what happened and why. If someone doesn’t tell you directly why they’re dropping you, or your ideas, you have no way of knowing. The “explanatory void” is one that you might fill with all sorts of speculation, most of it bad. This can include not only self-deprecatory thoughts but also anger at the ghoster. Why didn’t they have the guts to tell you goodbye to your face? How can they be so selfish as to take the easy way out?

It's unlikely, Park and Klein argue, that a ghostee ever thinks from the ghoster’s perspective. However, it could be that the ghoster wants to avoid saying anything that would be hurtful. Right or wrong, the ghoster may actually be trying to protect the person they are unceremoniously dumping.

Looking at Both Sides of Ghosting

To examine the possibility that ghosters actually do have the best interests of the ghosted in mind, the NYU research team embarked on a series of eight studies. They began by establishing the basic framework of ghosting as a form of rejection and then moved into experiments to understand how both parties in ghosting feel both while, and after, this is happening.

In the first three of these studies, Park and Klein showed that ghostees do, in fact, underestimate the extent to which ghosters were trying to protect their feelings. Next, the researchers created a hypothetical ghosting situation assigning participants to one or the other of the two roles. In this study, participants were told to imagine themselves as ghoster or ghostee involved in a potential meet-up to discuss a mutual hobby. To add another layer to the situation, they also gave positive reasons for ghosting (not enough time) and negative (deciding the ghostee wasn’t a good match).

To assess the motivations involved in these scenarios, ghosters rated self- versus other-oriented reasons for ghosting. Other-oriented reasons included not wanting to hurt the other person’s feelings or for the other person to feel rejected. Self-oriented reasons included not wanting to feel uncomfortable or awkward. Tapping into how much ghostees believed the other person cared about their well-being, they were asked to rate the ghoster. Ghosters rated themselves on how much they cared about the well-being of the person they were ghosting.

Consistent with the authors’ predictions, ghostees underestimated how much ghosters cared about their feelings, regardless of reason. However, in a later experiment, Park and Klein showed that ghosters were more likely to try to protect the other person when the reason for ghosting was negative.

In one particularly interesting twist, the research team created a scenario in which the ghoster was willing to provide actual help to the ghoster by offering useful advice. Because ghostees underestimated how much the ghoster cared about them, they were more likely to reject this opportunity than would be predicted by chance. Ghostees simply don’t trust the ghosters anymore.

Into the Mind of the Ghoster

The NYU team’s findings show that ghostees feel so downtrodden that they are unlikely to see this form of rejection as reflecting care or concern on the part of the rejector. Within the mind of ghosters, though, emotional conflict can become its own form of distress. In the first place, they might simply put off saying something they know will be hurtful until they finally don’t do it at all. Other than sheer procrastination, though, ghosters can struggle with figuring out exactly what words to use. Finally, they may fear the reaction of the person they’re rejecting, especially if the conversation devolves into a series of accusations.

Ghosting Essential Reads

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There is also no guarantee that should the ghoster actually start the conversation rolling, the truth for the rejection will come out. As the authors note, the ghoster “may end up talking about seemingly relevant but ultimately unproductive things, such as apologizing or sugarcoating the real reasons for rejection instead of providing the information ghostees want.”

All of this supports the idea in social psychology that the ending of a relationship, even one that’s not particularly deep, creates emotional havoc. No one can really ever know what the other person is thinking, especially when other-oriented motives start to distort what they do and say. Yet, rejection can’t be avoided completely, as not all relationships can go on indefinitely. The best people can do is try to find a common ground for rejection-based conversations, recognizing that someone’s feelings are potentially likely to be hurt.

To sum up, the Park and Klein study provides important insights into the feelings that people bring into the ambiguous ending of a relationship. Understanding both sides can help you protect you and the other person as you try to navigate these endings in a kinder and gentler way.