Guilt

Guilt as a Self-Conscious, Social-Moral Emotion

For social scientists who study the mind, guilt is defined as a self-conscious, social-moral emotion consisting of an unpleasant affective state, often accompanied by thoughts about the self having engaged in a blameworthy violation of a social norm (e.g., John felt guilty about not returning Mary's phone call). Guilt also refers to instances in which an individual experiences unpleasant feeling states while merely contemplating the future violation of a social convention or rule, in which case we refer to this as “anticipated” guilt (e.g., Mary felt guilty when she thought about not leaving a tip for the waitress).

Guilt is a social-moral emotion in that it is intimately related to social welfare, in the sense that guilt is triggered by real or perceived violations of culturally valued conventions and rules. As such, guilt is part of a family of emotions known as “moral sentiments,” which serve as a sort of “social glue,” allowing social relations to function efficiently. According to 18th-century economist Adam Smith, moral sentiments such as guilt serve this social function by virtue of their capacity to compel individuals to do one of the following: (a) abide by social conventions (i.e., an ostensible function of guilt) or (b) to generate applause toward others who succeed (i.e., an ostensible function of the moral sentiment admiration) or approbation toward those who fail (i.e., an ostensible function of the moral sentiment contempt or reproach) to uphold such standards.

Because the experience of guilt entails a focus on one's own adherence to social norms and conventions, guilt is seen as a self-conscious emotion rather than an other-focused emotion. Although other social-moral emotions such as contempt or reproach entail unpleasant feelings and thoughts generated in response to the blameworthy actions of others (e.g., John felt angry because Mary did not return his phone call), the emotion guilt always entails a focus on the actions (or inactions) of the self. Even in the case of “collective guilt,” whereby one incurs an unpleasant feeling while considering the blameworthy actions of a group with which one strongly identifies, the focus is ultimately on the self (e.g., John felt guilty when he learned that his firm was responsible for polluting the river).

Distinguishing Guilt and Shame

In everyday language, guilt is often confused with another self-conscious, social-moral emotion, shame. Guilt can be distinguished from shame in terms of the focus on evaluating one's own actions or omissions (i.e., guilt) versus evaluating one's personhood or self (i.e., shame). In this light, the term guilt more properly refers to a negative evaluation of one's own behavior (e.g., feeling guilty because you accidentally bumped into another car in the parking lot), whereas shame refers to a negative evaluation of one's personhood (e.g., feeling ashamed because you believe that you are a bad person). Another important distinction between guilt and shame centers on the contrast between the sometimes adaptive consequences associated with experiencing guilt and the often maladaptive correlates of shame proneness. Research by June Tangney and others has shown that guilt is an adaptive emotion that facilitates cooperation, whereas shame is often seen as a less adaptive emotion, promoting withdrawal or externalizing in the form of aggression. The next section briefly reviews the research on the social-behavioral consequences of guilt.

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