Differences and Similarities in Forgiveness Seeking Across Childhood and Adolescence

Abstract

The current study examines age-related differences and similarities in forgiveness seeking. Students in third, seventh, and 12th grade imagined themselves committing various transgressions and the characteristics of these transgression (e.g., severity of consequences, type of offense) were manipulated. Across the age groups, forgiveness seeking was predicted by guilt, whereas withdrawal was predicted by shame. For all age groups, forgiveness seeking was more likely to occur when the offense was an active one rather than a failure to act. However, age differences were found in how offense severity affected forgiveness seeking. Older students were more likely to seek forgiveness when the offense was high rather than low in severity, but younger students did not show this difference. Age differences were also found in the motivations for seeking forgiveness. Finally, teacher ratings of students' overall prosocial behavior were positively correlated with forgiveness seeking.

Forgiveness, Gratitude, Happiness, and Prosocial Bystander Behavior in Bullying

“…Most of the studies exploring prosocial bystander behavior in bullying use theoretical frameworks around moral judgment or emotions. Despite the larger evidence suggesting that character strengths and happiness are associated with prosocial behavior (Light et al, 2015;Riek and DeWit, 2018;Yost-Dubrow and Dunham, 2018), no study known by the authors has explored the relationship between forgiveness, gratitude, happiness, and prosocial behavior in bullying. Furthermore, the literature regarding bystanders' behavior in bullying events within the Mexican context is still scarce.…”

“…Since previous scholars have reported direct and indirect positive relations between gratitude, forgiveness, happiness, and prosocial behavior (Meier and Stutzer, 2008;Rudd et al, 2014;Light et al, 2015;Sulemana, 2016;Riek and DeWit, 2018;Yost-Dubrow and Dunham, 2018), a positive relationship between these variables and prosocial behavior in bullying was anticipated. Moreover, prosocial behavior was expected to influence character strengths and happiness, as previous empirical evidence has shown (Lerner et al, 2003;Dunn et al, 2014;Aknin et al, 2015;Carlo et al, 2015;Fu et al, 2017;Al-yaaribi et al, 2018;Bieda et al, 2019).…”

“…This strength concerns a set of coping responses that encompass an increase in positive attitude and prosocial approach to others (Worthington, 1998;Hui and Ho, 2004;Flanagan et al, 2012). Forgiveness has been related to the engagement in positive strategies focused on solving interpersonal conflicts in adolescents (Ahmed and Braithwaite, 2006;Egan and Todorov, 2009;Flanagan et al, 2012;Quintana-Orts and Rey, 2018;León-Moreno et al, 2019) and prosocial behaviors (Karremans et al, 2005;Karremans and Van Lange, 2008;Riek and DeWit, 2018). Moreover, forgiveness helps adolescents to maintain close bonds and increase their happiness (McCullough, 2000;Maltby et al, 2005).…”

“…While recent studies show that gratitude and forgiveness have the twofold benefit of decreasing the risk of aggression and victimization and also reducing the negative consequences of being bullied (Karremans et al, 2005;Egan and Todorov, 2009;Riek and DeWit, 2018;Rey et al, 2019;Yu and Chan, 2019), little is known about their relations with bystander behavior.…”

The Effects of Forgiveness, Gratitude, and Self-Control on Reactive and Proactive Aggression in Bullying

“…The literature has also found differences by age. Studies report that both types of aggression decrease with age [ 83 , 92 , 93 ]. Moreover, research findings suggest that forgiveness and gratitude increase with age [ 92 , 93 , 94 , 95 ].…”