Situational approach to assessment of guilt: Development and validation of a self-report measure

The present research developed and evaluated a self-report measure of guilt that encompassed diverse, typical guilt experiences. Behavior-analytic procedures were employed to construct the Situational Guilt Scale (SGS), in which 22 items assessed anticipated guilt feelings for a wide range of naturally occurring specific situations. The SGS was administered to young-adult college students (mean age, 24 years), along with measures of guilt in traditional moral contexts, depressive tendencies, and socially desirable responding. A test-retest study of the SGS was separately conducted. Results indicated that SGS scores had statisfactory internal consistencies and considerable stability. Correlational findings and comparisons of SGS scores in a typology of depressive experience showed relationships of SGS guilt scores with dependent and self-critical tendencies and support the validity of the measure. The findings and utility of the SGS are discussed.Grant 13487 from the PSC-CUNY Research Award Program of the City University of New York provided support for this project. The Committee on Research Computing of the City University of New York funded the use of computer facilities.