The exemplary social emotion guilt: Not so relationship-oriented when another person repairs for you

Guilt is considered by many researchers to be the hallmark social emotion. Guilt theories perceive guilt to be a negative emotion with positive interpersonal consequences, and empirical research has shown guilt to motivate prosocial behaviours aimed at restoring the relationship with one's victims. The current research questions the relationship-oriented nature of this emotion. Five experiments reveal that when a person repairs the transgressor's damage caused to a victim, the transgressor's guilt feelings, reparative intentions, and prosocial behaviour decrease. These findings suggest that it is not the relationship with the victim that is important in the regulation of guilt feelings, but rather the reparative actions that have been undertaken. Implications for theory and behavioural research on guilt are discussed.     

Empathy, Shame, Guilt, and Narratives of Interpersonal Conflicts: Guilt-Prone People Are Better at Perspective Taking

Both guilt and empathic perspective taking have been linked to prosocial, relationship-enhancing effects. Study 1 found that shame was linked to personal distress, whereas guilt was linked to perspective taking. In Studies 2 and 3, subjects were asked to describe a recent experience of interpersonal conflict, once from their own perspective, and once from the perspective of the other person. Guilt-prone people and guilt-dominated stories were linked to better perspective taking (measured by changes between the two versions of the story) than others. Shame had no effect. Guilt improved relationship outcomes but shame harmed them. Path analysis suggested that trait guilt-proneness leads to perspective taking, which leads to actual guilt feelings, which produces beneficial relationship outcomes. Guilt feelings may mediate the relationship-enhancing effects of empathy.     

Influence of social context on the relationship between guilt and prosocial behaviour

While some previous researchers have found that guilt encourages prosocial behaviour towards a victim at the expense of other people, others have found the opposite, that is, people allocate resources at the expense of themselves. The present research used a hypothetical scenario method to determine which of these patterns would be replicated in the collectivistic context of Japanese society. In addition, we separated the cause of feelings of guilt into having caused harm and being at fault, and examined in more detail the effect of guilt on prosocial behaviour. Our results show that, in line with the second set of previous researchers, participants who were induced to feel guilt for having caused harm were more likely to allocate their resources to their victim at the expense of themselves than were individuals in the no‐harm condition. This suggests that differences in social context influence the effect of guilt on prosocial behaviour in different ways.     

What is moral about guilt? Acting "prosocially" at the disadvantage of others

For centuries economists and psychologists have argued that the morality of moral emotions lies in the fact that they stimulate prosocial behavior and benefit others in a person's social environment. Many studies have shown that guilt, arguably the most exemplary moral emotion, indeed motivates prosocial behavior in dyadic social dilemma situations. When multiple persons are involved, however, the moral and prosocial nature of this emotion can be questioned. The present article shows how guilt can have beneficial effects for the victim of one's actions but also disadvantageous effects for other people in the social environment. A series of experiments, with various emotion inductions and dependent measures, all reveal that guilt motivates prosocial behavior toward the victim at the expense of others around-but not at the expense of oneself. These findings illustrate that a thorough understanding of the functioning of emotions is necessary to understand their moral nature.     

Guilty feelings, targeted actions

Early investigations of guilt cast it as an emotion that prompts broad reparative behaviors that help guilty individuals feel better about themselves or about their transgressions. The current investigation found support for a more recent representation of guilt as an emotion designed to identify and correct specific social offenses. Across five experiments, guilt influenced behavior in a targeted and strategic way. Guilt prompted participants to share resources more generously with others, but only did so when those others were persons whom the participant had wronged and only when those wronged individuals could notice the gesture. Rather than trigger broad reparative behaviors that remediate one's general reputation or self-perception, guilt triggers targeted behaviors intended to remediate specific social transgressions.     

道德视野下的内疚

几十年来, 内疚备受国内外研究者的关注, 其研究多从儿童发展、心理健康等方面展开。而近些年, 研究者关注的焦点开始转向内疚的道德层面, 即关注人际交往或社会事件中情绪的道德价值。内疚作为一种道德情绪, 是伴随道德意识的发展而发展的, 在维持和修复社会关系以及情绪情感发展中起着重要作用。因此, 文章从道德视角对内疚的界定、产生机制、行为反应以及亲社会作用等方面进行了梳理和探讨, 以期为国内的同类研究提供一些新的线索。     

Group‐Based Shame and Guilt: Emerging Directions in Research

Research on the role of emotion in social identity, group processes, and intergroup conflict is burgeoning. This paper examines recent research on group‐based shame and guilt and describes important themes in this research. Guilt and shame are distinguished by different appraisals and motivations in intergroup contexts. Group‐based shame is associated with threats to group‐image and motivations to protect and repair that image. In contrast, group‐based guilt is associated with efforts to repair and apologize for ingroup wrongdoing. Current research is expanding in several important directions. First, the scope of emotions is expanding beyond that of shame and guilt to consider the roles of emotions such as ingroup‐directed anger in situations that may also provoke group‐based shame and guilt. Second, people’s motivations to avoid feeling group‐based shame and guilt are becoming better understood, particularly in relation to different aspects of social identification. Finally, we argue that dynamic processes in emotion expression and experience, particularly due to the relation between perpetrator and victim groups, are an important future direction in research on group‐based shame and guilt.     

内疚与亲社会行为的关系：来自元分析的证据

内疚作为一种典型的道德情绪, 被认为具有亲社会作用, 但很多研究却发现内疚并不总能促进亲社会行为。为了明确内疚对亲社会行为的作用, 分析造成结论分歧的可能原因, 本研究采用元分析方法探讨了特质内疚与亲社会行为的关系以及状态内疚对亲社会行为的影响。共有46篇文献92个独立样本纳入元分析(N = 17248)。元分析结果表明：(1)特质内疚与亲社会行为之间存在中等程度的正相关, 二者之间的关系受到亲社会行为类型的调节, 相比较捐赠、助人、环保行为等, 特质内疚与补偿之间的相关更强; (2)启动内疚状态能显著提升个体的亲社会行为, 但两者之间的关联呈较小的效应量, 亲社会行为对象在其中起到调节作用, 感到内疚的个体更愿意对受害方做出亲社会行为; (3) p曲线(p-curve)分析发现, 两个元分析研究的p曲线均呈显著右偏态, 表明特质内疚与亲社会行为的关系以及状态内疚对亲社会行为的影响均存在真实的效应, 而不是出版偏倚或者p hacking导致。     

Shame and guilt as behaviour regulators: Relationships with bullying,victimization and prosocial behaviour

This study aimed at investigating intentional and non‐intentional situations eliciting shame and guilt in relation to children's involvement in bullying, victimization and prosocial behaviour. We used the contextual model designed by Olthof, Schouten, Kuiper, Stegge, and Jennekens‐Schinkel (2000) according to which certain situations elicit more shame than guilt (‘shame‐only’, SO), whereas others elicit both guilt and shame (‘shame‐and‐guilt’, SAG). Besides these, four new scenarios were added (2 SO and 2 SAG) in which the protagonist was alternatively the perpetrator or the receiver of harm. Participants were 121 children aged 9–11, who filled in the self‐report Shame and Guilt Questionnaire, and a peer nomination survey to investigate the roles of bully, victim, prosocial and not involved. Results showed that in SAG situations, perpetrated‐harm situations elicited more guilt than neutral situations; while in SO situations, neutral situations elicited more shame than received‐harm situations. In SAG situations, prosocial children reported feeling more ashamed and guilty than bullies and not‐involved children, while in SO situations, victims scored higher on shame than not‐involved children. Results are discussed considering the contextual model employed and the relationship between emotions and behaviours.     

儿童内疚情绪对其亲社会行为的影响

为考察儿童内疚情绪对其亲社会行为的影响,本研究采用现场实验的方法探讨了小学5年级学生内疚情绪与其亲社会行为的关系。结果显示：（1）内疚情绪能促进儿童亲社会行为水平的提高,难过情绪不能促进儿童亲社会行为水平的提高;（2）当儿童将注意力集中于自己对团体造成的不良影响,产生内疚情绪,但如果其将注意力集中于自己的不良结果时,则产生难过情绪。结论：儿童的消极情绪是否能促进其亲社会行为水平的提高,取决于其将注意力集中于自己还是他人。     

What do the TOSCA guilt and shame scales really measure: Affect or action?

Psychologists have long used the Test of Self-Conscious Affect (TOSCA) as an instrument for empirically distinguishing between trait emotions of guilt and shame. Recent assessments of the internal structure of the TOSCA guilt scale suggest that it may not measure the experience of guilt, but rather motivation to make amends for personal wrongdoing. In contrast, TOSCA shame may better assess the tendency to experience negative self-conscious affect. Previous research did not take into account that TOSCA guilt theoretically should only predict emotions in a situation of wrongdoing; we put this idea to the test in two studies. Experimental, but not control, participants received believable feedback that they had shown involuntary prejudice towards a member of a minority group. In both studies TOSCA guilt predicted reparative action after feedback was given, including expressing non-prejudiced views and recommending financial compensation to the minority group. However, TOSCA guilt had no relationship with feelings of guilt or shame after expressing prejudice. In contrast, TOSCA shame was a better predictor of feelings of guilt, shame and other self-critical emotions, but did not predict compensatory action. These findings suggest motivation rather than emotion as a mechanism behind past findings involving TOSCA guilt.     

A dynamic model of guilt: implications for motivation and self-regulation in the context of prejudice

Guilt is widely recognized as an important self-regulatory emotion, yet alternative theoretical accounts view guilt primarily as either a punishment cue or a prosocial motivator. Integrating these views, we propose that guilt functions dynamically to first provide a negative reinforcement cue associated with reduced approach motivation, which transforms into approach-motivated behavior when an opportunity for reparation presents itself. We tested this hypothesis in the context of racial prejudice. White subjects viewed a multiracial series of faces while cortical activity was recorded using electroencephalography. Following bogus feedback indicating anti-Black responses, subjects reported elevated guilt, which was associated with changes in frontal cortical asymmetry indicating reduced approach motivation. When subjects were presented with an opportunity to engage in prejudice-reducing behavior, guilt predicted greater interest in prejudice reduction, which in turn was associated with an approach-related shift in frontal asymmetry. The results support a dynamic model in which guilt is associated with adaptive changes in motivation and behavior.     

Gaining Control Over Traumatic Experiences: The Role of Guilt in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

The present study explores the relationship between guilt, sense of control, and posttraumatic stress disorder. Seventy-eight participants who had experienced a traumatic event completed the following self-report measures online: the Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale, the Guilt Cognitions subscale of the Trauma-Related Guilt Inventory, the Posttraumatic Cognitions Inventory, and Sense of Control During the Trauma. Results revealed that “behavioral self-blame” that refers to functioning during the trauma, positively correlated with posttraumatic stress symptoms. However, when Sense of Control During the Trauma was introduced into the analysis, this correlation appeared only for participants who had experienced lack of control during the traumatic event. Among the participants who had experienced a sense of control, no such link was found. Results suggest that guilt may be produced to avoid feelings of helplessness following the trauma, because guilt conveys a sense of control.     

Scham und Schuld – Sein und Tun

Shame and guilt are affective experiential dimensions regulating the different forms of being and behaving in a social context. Constructive or even pathologic feelings of guilt are to be distinguished from real guilt. Shame refers to the judgment of ?So-sein” even if being often manifests itself in action. Shame is generated by the ideal ego. Guilt and feelings of guilt are dimensions of acting, real guilt requires the recognition of guilt, guilt is generated by the superego (conscience). The implications of familiar as well as extreme traumatisation for shame and feelings of guilt are discussed. The most frequent wish for a therapy nowadays that offers perspectives of changes by action can be considered as a defence against processing of the being in psychoanalytical therapy.     

Shame and guilt: A hundred years of apples and oranges

An original model of shame- and guilt-related emotions is proposed and the model's theoretical background discussed. Shame is conceptualized as an affect (i.e., basic emotion), elicited by personal devaluation and evolved by social selection. Guilt is conceptualized as a cognitively assessed condition. In response to awareness of one's own condition of guilt, one may feel a number of affects or no affect. The phrase feeling guilty is a non-specific reference to feeling as one typically feels when in the condition of guilt [Ortony, A. (1987). Is guilt an emotion? Cognition and emotion, 1, 283-298]. Thus, shame as a construct represents a single affect, while feelings of guilt represent multiple affective-cognitive hybrids, which may be associated with the condition of guilt. In terms of levels of categorization [Rosch, E. (1978). Principles of categorization. In E. Rosch & B. B. Lloyd (Eds.), Cognition and categorization (pp. 27-48). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum], shame, as an affect, is a basic level category with subordinates such as embarrassment and humiliation; in contrast, the multiple feelings of guilt constitute multiple subordinate affective-cognitive hybrids—subordinate to a number of basic level affects. This model integrates a great deal of existing data, suggests a large number of hypotheses, and implies the need for a profile approach to the assessment of guilt. By conceptualizing shame as an affect, and making the distinction between guilt as a state and the multiple affective-cognitive hybrids of guilt, much of the confusion and imprecision in past theory and research may be clarified.     

Forgive them for I have sinned: The relationship between guilt and forgiveness of others' transgressions

We propose that guilt leads to forgiveness of others' transgressions. In Study 1, people prone to experience guilt (but not shame) were also prone to forgive others for past misdeeds. In Study 2, we manipulated harm‐ and inequity‐based guilt; both increased forgiveness of others' transgressions. Further, the effect of guilt on forgiveness was mediated by identification with the transgressor. In Study 3, we replicated the guilt–forgiveness relationship and examined three other plausible mediators: capability for similar wrongdoing, empathic understanding, and general identification; only identification with the transgressor satisfied the criteria for mediation. In Study 4, we induced guilt by asking participants to harm a friend or stranger. Guilt induced by harming a friend led to greater forgiveness of third‐party transgressors, and again, identification with the transgressor mediated the effect. We discuss the implications of these results for understanding how the prosocial effects of guilt extend beyond the boundaries of a single interpersonal relationship.     

Portuguese Mothers and Fathers Share Similar Levels of Work-Family Guilt According to a Newly Validated Measure

Transformations in family and work life have led to profound changes in the articulation of both spheres. The massive entry of women into the labor market, the decline of a family model based on the male provider, increasing job demands, and persistent gender inequality are factors that can generate work-family conflict and lead to feelings of guilt. Work-family guilt is a topic still rarely studied, particularly in Portugal. Given the importance of understanding the complexity of the relationships underlying the work-family interface and the lack of instruments in Portuguese to assess the feeling of guilt as it pertains to the work-family interface, our goal was to adapt the Work-Family Guilt Scale (WFGS) to the Portuguese population. Our results confirmed the two-dimensional structure of the scale with good reliability and validity. The WFGS was invariant between genders, with no significant mean differences between men and women. Convergent validity with the variables of work-to-family and family-to-work conflict and discriminant validity between the two dimensions of the WFGS was demonstrated. Use of this scale will allow the identification of feelings of guilt, which pose risks to the physical, emotional and psychological well-being of workers. Guilt feelings should, like conflict, be considered as a psychosocial risk that must be mitigated through policies and practices aimed at promoting a balance between family and working life.     

How Different Guilt Feelings Can Affect Social Competence Development in Childhood

The authors examined how the two different dimensions of guilt feelings, needed for reparation and fear of punishment, could influence social conduct, such as prosocial and aggressive behaviors, and how they are linked to popularity in childhood. The authors hypothesized a theoretical model that they tested, fitting it with empirical data obtained from a sample of 242 Italian children 9–11 years old. Both dimensions of guilt predict prosocial and aggressive behaviors. Specifically, the feeling of guilt linked to the need for reparation tends to negatively predict aggressive behaviors, and positively predict prosocial behaviors. The feeling of guilt linked to the fear of punishment, on the contrary, tends to positively affect aggressive and negatively affect prosocial conducts in children. These results highlight that the different feelings of guilt can represent a relevant risk or protective factor for the development of social competence in childhood. Limitations, strengths, and further development of the present study are discussed.     

The role of dual categorization and relative ingroup prototypicality in reparations to a minority group: An examination of empathy and collective guilt as mediators

In the current study, we investigate factors that facilitate or otherwise obstruct reparations of a perpetrating group (i.e. Muslims) to a victim group (i.e. Christians). The study (N = 200) reveals that among Muslim participants, the role of dual Abrahamic categorization in positively predicting reparation attitude towards Christians was mediated by the first group's prosocial emotions of empathy and collective guilt towards the latter group. In addition, relative Muslim prototypicality negatively predicted dual Abrahamic categorization and each of the two prosocial emotions. Empathy and collective guilt in turn mediated the role of relative ingroup prototypicality in negatively predicting reparation attitude. Moreover, as hypothesized, we found that the roles of empathy and collective guilt in predicting reparation intention, as manifested in participants' willingness to engage in collective action on behalf of the victim group, were not significant on their own, but were mediated by reparation attitude. These findings shed light on the importance of the relationship between the perpetrating group's shared identity with the victim group, reduced ingroup focus and its support for making reparations to the victim group. Theoretical implications, study limitations and practical strategies highlighting how to decrease relative Muslim prototypicality are discussed.     

小学生内疚情绪理解能力的发展

为了考察小学生内疚情绪理解能力的发展特点,研究采用问卷调查的方法调查两类成人(99名教师和278名家长)对小学生内疚情绪产生情景的评价,并在此基础上采用临床访谈的方法探究小学生内疚情绪理解能力的发展,结果发现:(1)相对于人际交往情景而言,小学生在学业情景中表现出更高的内疚理解能力;(2)在学业情景中,1年级到3年级是小学生内疚理解能力快速增长的时期。