Shame and Guilt PDF

Shame and guilt Shame and guilt — Shame and guilt are self-conscious emotions. ◦ Self-conscious in the sense that the emotions relate to the self (one’s characteristics), how one behaved, or something related to the self (such as one’s clothing). ◦ Other self-conscious emotions include embarrassment...

Shame and guilt Shame and guilt — Shame and guilt are self-conscious emotions. ◦ Self-conscious in the sense that the emotions relate to the self (one’s characteristics), how one behaved, or something related to the self (such as one’s clothing). ◦ Other self-conscious emotions include embarrassment and pride, which are also covered in the course. Shame and guilt — From a social functional perspective, shame and guilt should promote behaviour that is beneficial for other group members. In first reading in course: ◦ Shame: Display reduced status. ◦ Guilt: Motivates the repair of some harm one caused. ◦ More recent research suggests that shame may also motivate repair, and it can be argued that showing guilt is displays lower status. Shame and guilt — Shame and guilt are often related in subjective experience, but are different from each other. ◦ Shame is defined in the English language as “a condition of humiliating disgrace or disrepute” (Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed.). ◦ Guilt is “the fact of having committed a breach of conduct…” (Merriam Webster’s). Shame — In psychology, we define shame and guilt in ways consistent with general usage in English. A woman feeling shame feels that she is bad or inadequate as a person. She sees her whole self as being unacceptable (in line with disgrace). ◦ In your first reading by Lewis, he gives many examples of people feeling shame. As he states, shame “encompasses the whole of ourselves.” ◦ As such, feeling shame is a very uncomfortable emotion. Guilt — A woman feels guilt about a specific action or behaviour that she has committed, or about some inaction. ◦ Guilt is more specific in its referent. ◦ Guilt is a less severe emotion than shame. Shame and guilt: Distinction — Helen Block Lewis, a clinical psychologist, was influential in drawing this conceptual distinction between shame and guilt. ◦ See reading by Tangney on this. — June Tangney and colleagues initiated the wave of contemporary empirical research on shame and guilt. ◦ One of your readings on shame and guilt is by Tangney and Dearing. Different situational determinants Guilt is more linked to moral failures (e.g., lying, cheating, infidelity, not helping others). — Shame can be linked to both moral and non-moral failures. Non-moral failures include poor performance on some task, socially inappropriate behavior or dress, engaging in sex, hurting someone emotionally (in Tangney self-report research with young US adults). — Differences in Public exposure (Smith et al., 2002) — Shame more than guilt is linked to public exposure. ◦ Study 1: Participants perceived individuals as feeling more shame when committing a public vs. a private moral transgression. No differences for rated guilt. ◦ Study 2: More rated nonmoral shame when: – Participants read descriptions of someone with an inferior characteristic that was public relative to private. No differences for rated guilt. Differences in public exposure ◦ Study 3: Content analyses of fictional writing for use of the words “shame” and “guilt.” ◦ Study 4: More shame over guilt (forced choice) for public relative to private for recalled moral transgressions (bad deed) and nonmoral failures. ◦ Bottom line of these studies: Shame is often public, and shaming is the act of causing another person to feel shame, usually by criticizing them in public. Shame and guilt vs. embarrassment Shame and guilt are different from embarrassment. — Shame and guilt as compared to embarrassment have been rated as more intense and as involving: — ◦ ◦ ◦ ◦ ◦ More painful emotions, A greater sense of moral transgression, More felt responsibility and regret, More anger at self, and Feeling that others are also angry at oneself. Shame and guilt vs. embarrassment — Embarrassment occurs with ◦ ◦ ◦ ◦ more trivial and humorous events, was more sudden, and involved a greater sense of surprise, a greater sense of exposure and conspicuousness, and… – E.g., spilling a glass of water on yourself, stumbling in front of a crowd, or singing out loud while driving your car, and people in the next car overhear you. ◦ larger audiences Distinguishing between acute and chronic shame or guilt — Acute: occurs as a consequence of some specific event or circumstance. ◦ It is of short duration. ◦ Effects are temporary. — Chronic: is evident as a stable tendency over time to feel shame or guilt. ◦ It is assessed as a personality or dispositional variable. ◦ Effects are stable and enduring. Shame and guilt co-occur — When people report feeling shame, they also generally report feeling guilt. ◦ The correlation between shame and guilt is quite high (e.g., r ~. 60). ◦ This is true for acute episodes. ◦ This is true for chronic tendencies. Chronic shame and guilt Chronic shame and/or guilt ◦ This is assessed by asking individuals to imagine that they are the protagonist in a number of different situations. – These are situations in which the protagonist may have or has done some harm or wrongdoing. – Participants indicate from a specified list what their reactions would be to this harm or wrongdoing. – The list does not explicitly refer to shame or guilt. – You can assess how much participants feel shame or guilt by how much they endorse each reaction. Test of Self-Conscious Affect (TOSCA) — — — A self-report measure on proneness to shame and proneness to guilt. Items are like this one: "A friend asks you to do him/her a favor. Though you could reasonably go out of your way slightly, you just don't feel like doing it. So you turn him/her down. Later you tell yourself..." Participants rate: ◦ "Why am I so selfish?" (shame). ◦ "I'll find a way to make up for this" (guilt). ◦ "Some people expect too much from their friends" (externalization). ◦ "This kind of thing happens now and then between friends" (detachment/unconcern). Impact of shame vs. guilt based on TOSCA chronic tendencies — To assess the impact of “shame-free” guilt, measure both proneness to feelings of shame and of guilt and use statistical procedures to control for shame while examining how guilt is related to other measures, such as of depression or psychopathology. ◦ Similarly, the impact of “guilt-free” shame is assessed by controlling for guilt proneness while examining how shame proneness is related to other measures. Impact of shame vs. guilt based on TOSCA chronic tendencies As indicated in the reading, “shame-free” guilt is not associated with negative states (depression, psychopathology) and is associated with fewer reported negative behaviours. — “Guilt-free” shame is associated with negative states and more reported negative behaviours (self-reported aggression and drug use). — Impact of shame vs. guilt based on TOSCA chronic tendencies — “Guilt-free” shame is associated with more aggression because people who feel more shame blame others/circumstances more for their failures and shortcomings (Stuewig et al., 2010). ◦ This is seen with higher externalization ratings on the TOSCA. ◦ This is seen with higher verbal and physical aggression ratings on self-report measures (but little with others’ ratings or records of infractions). Impact of shame vs. guilt based on TOSCA chronic tendencies — Note that all this research was conducted in Western countries, notably the US. ◦ These findings may hold true more for individualistic countries than for collectivistic countries. ◦ Shame is valued in collectivistic countries, and is seen as an appropriate response to failure (one’s own or a close other). – Shame is consistent with a focus on interdependence, adjustment to group standards, and self-effacement. The benefits of acute guilt Empirical study of acute shame and guilt ◦ Participants’ descriptions of past experiences when they felt shame and/or guilt. – What happened and what did they feel (e.g., sense of self, action tendencies) – This can provide distinctions between guilt and shame. See Tangney and Dearing reading on the differences they documented (more recent research qualifies this, as we discuss soon). ◦ Laboratory induction of guilt or shame. Acute guilt about an event as adaptive emotion — Guilt supports forgiveness seeking (Riek et al., 2014). ◦ University students recalled an incident: they upset or were in conflict with someone, the situation remain unresolved, and they felt they were at least partly to blame. ◦ Guilt and shame are explicitly assessed. ◦ Feeling more responsible, seeing their offense as more severe, and feeling more committed to the relationship all lead to more guilt (few links for shame). Only guilt leads more forgiveness seeking. Acute guilt about an event as adaptive emotion — Guilt supports forgiveness seeking (Riek et al., 2014). ◦ Forgiveness seeking included: apologizing, reconciliation, making amends, drawing attention to one’s own faults or weaknesses, admitting to the other that they were wrong, and trying to explain their behavior. Acute guilt about an event as adaptive emotion — It is good that guilt leads to wanting to repair the harm that was done. ◦ Repair is beneficial for the other person, and for the relationship. ◦ It is also beneficial for the guilty individual. – The guilty individual may then be more likely to forgive him/herself (Fisher & Exline, 2010). — Guilt that is followed by repair or a resolution to not transgress again is referred to as “good” guilt, as opposed to “bad” guilt (see Tangney & Dearing reading). Acute guilt about an event as adaptive emotion — It has also been argued that showing guilt can be beneficial (see Baumeister et al., 1994). ◦ Showing guilt can signal reduced status. ◦ It shows to the other person that you care. – This may benefit the other person. ◦ It creates equity or balance in distress. – Both the harm-doer and the one harmed are in distress. – In general, equity and balance are important in relationships. Effects of acute shame Acute shame can be functional: (De Hooge et al., 2008) Proselfs vs. prosocials — The hypothesis was that proselfs who are led to feel shame are more likely to cooperate with another person afterwards… — ◦ If the other person is someone who knows of the shameful experience. ◦ But not if the other person does not know of the shameful experience. ◦ In contrast, prosocials are not affected by shame, in terms of how much they cooperate. Shame is functional — Study 1: Imagined shame and the dilemma game ◦ The game involves 2 players, each of which decides on giving tickets to the other player. – Each ticket is worth $0.50 to you and $1.00 to the other. The other person has the same decision to make. Each player decides how much to give to the other without knowing the other’s decision. Study 2: Recalled shame and the game. — Study 3: Experienced shame and the game. — Good or bad effects of acute shame (Leach and Sidam, 2015)? — — In general, acute shame has positive effects when people see their own failure or tarnished social image as reparable. Acute shame motivates behaviour aimed at restoring a positive self-image threatened by failure. ◦ Improve one’s performance or ◦ Act prosocially (as in the de Hooge research on proselfs being more cooperative), or ◦ Act in any other way that would improve one’s self-image. — This is for approaching other people directly affected by the failure or directly aware of the failure, when you can compensate or make up for the failure. Good or bad effects of acute shame? — Acute shame has negative effects (e.g., avoidance, withdrawal) when people see their own failure or tarnished social image as not reparable. ◦ For example, participants cause harm to another in a lab setting, but never interact again with that person (i.e., cannot apologize, compensate, or cooperate). – Participants do not want to think about it, and avoid this type of situation. Bad or good effects? — The prevailing view in psychology for some time in the 1990s and early 2000s had been that acute shame had harmful effects as it encouraged people to avoid others and the shaming situation, and to aggress (e.g., Tangney & Dearing reading). ◦ Now we know that context determines how people react to feeling acute shame. Yet, shame is more complex…both acute and chronic can have both adaptive and maladaptive effects Acute shame encourages selfgrowth and distancing — Participants recalled either a time when they felt shame or guilt or embarrassment, and reported on felt shame, guilt, and embarrassment in all conditions (Lickel et al., 2014). ◦ They reported on motivation to change the self, repair the damage (e.g., “I tried to do something after the event to make it better”), or distance themselves (e.g., “I wanted to distance myself as much as possible from the event.”) Acute shame encourages selfgrowth and distancing — Across all the participants: More shame was linked to wanting to change the self more, and to distance oneself from the event. — More guilt was linked to wanting more repair, and a little to wanting to change the self. — More embarrassment is linked to wanting to distance yourself from the event. — Shame proneness can both increase and decrease recidivism (Tangney et al., 2014) — Jail inmates (n=476) complete the TOSCA, and official arrest records are examined 1 year after release into community. ◦ Guilt proneness predicts less arrests. ◦ Shame proneness in combination with externalization of blame leads to more arrests. – Unexpectedly, once externalization is controlled for statistically, the remaining shame leads to less arrests. What to conclude for acute and chronic shame? — Acute shame seems generally adaptive (i.e., leads to beneficial behavior), but it can have lead to harmful behavior in some cases. — Chronic shame is generally maladaptive, with some evidence that it might be beneficial as well. Shame in clinical settings — The clinical work of Thomas Scheff Alternative approach to studying shame: nonconscious shame — From a clinical perspective, shame may not be represented in conscious experience (see examples in Lewis reading). ◦ Lewis mentioned that many married couples get caught in shaming interaction styles. – “When are you going to start that diet of yours?” ◦ Thomas J. Scheff has studied family dynamics and proposes that interactions among family members may involve mutual shaming. Nonconscious shame in family interactions (Scheff) In some families, there is ongoing conflict. Scheff argues that conflict is caused by feelings of shame that remain unacknowledged. — The diagnosis of nonconscious shame is from the perspective of a third party observer (the wise clinical psychologist). — These feelings of shame are harmful in many ways. — Nonconscious shame in family interactions (Scheff) Family member A attacks B in subtle or indirect ways, and there may also be explicit blaming. B then feels ashamed, and then angry, which leads to aggressive behavior (intent to harm) against A. — A then feels shame, and then anger, and then aggresses B. And the cycle continues. — Nonconscious shame in family interactions (Scheff) People don't seem to be aware of this cycle. People don't seem to be aware that there is this attack-counterattack pattern in behaviour. — Much of the communication is indirect. People don't really say what they are feeling. As well, there may be much hostility in the way things are said. —