In a two-wave, longitudinal study, 221 nonreferred adolescents completed measures of guilt, shame, Behavioral self-blame (BSB), Characterological self-blame (CSB), depressive symptoms measures, and attributional style. Goals were to examine similarities between Tangney's (1996) conceptualization of guilt and shame and Janoff-Bulman's (1979) conceptualization of BSB and CSB in adolescents. Specific aims were (1) to examine the relation of depressive symptoms and depressive cognitions to shame, guilt, CSB, and BSB, (2) to estimate the longitudinal relations between depressive symptoms and measures of guilt, shame, BSB, and CSB, and (3) to assess the convergent and discriminant validity of shame/CSB measures and guilt/BSB measures. Results suggest that shame and CSB converge into a common construct, significantly related to depressive symptoms and cognitions. Convergence of guilt and BSB, however, was limited to particular pairs of measures.One research tradition has focused on the relation of guilt and shame to depression, as well as anger, hostility, substance abuse, eating disorders, low self-efficacy, and poor problem solving (Covert, Tangney, Maddux, & Heleno, 2003;Dearing, Stuewig, & Tangney, 2005;Ferguson, Stegge, Miller, & Olsen, 1999;Luyten, Fontaine, & Corveleyn, 2002;Sanftner, Barlow, Marschall, & Tangney, 1995;Tangney, Burggraf, & Wagner, 1995;Woien, Ernst, Patock-Peckham, & Nagoshi, 2003). Another research tradition has studied the relation of behavioral and characterological self-blame to depression as well as loneliness, isolation, uncontrollability, helplessness, and stressful life events (Anderson, Horowitz, & French, 1983;Cole, Peeke, & Ingold, 1996;Janoff-Bulman, 1979;Peterson, 1979;Peterson, Schwartz, & Seligman, 1981;Stoltz & Galassi, 1989).Correspondences concerning this article should be addressed to David A. Cole, Department of Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University 0552 GPC, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN 37203. david.cole@vanderbilt.edu..
NIH Public AccessAuthor Manuscript J Soc Clin Psychol. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2014 November 20. Published in final edited form as:J Soc Clin Psychol. 2008 ; 27(8): 809-842. doi:10.1521/jscp.2008.
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NIH-PA Author ManuscriptDespite noteworthy conceptual similarities between these two pairs of constructs, almost no one has examined them conjointly (cf. Lutwak, Panish, & Ferrari, 2003). Linking these two traditions could have implications for theory and research pertaining to a very wide range of psychological and mental health outcomes. The overarching goal of the current study is to examine the relation of the guilt/shame constructs and the behavioral/characterological selfblame constructs to each other, to depression, and to depression-related cognitions, potentially paving the way for a clearer unification of these two research traditions.
GUILT AND SHAMEIn this paper, we adhere to definitions of guilt and shame first articulated by Lewis (1971) and subsequently ela...