Forgiveness: A Cognitive-Motivational Anatomy

Abstract

This work aims to identify the constituents of forgiveness in terms of the forgiver's beliefs and motivating goals. After addressing the antecedents of forgiveness—a perceived wrong—and distinguishing the notion of mere harm from that of offense, we describe the victim's typical retributive reactions—revenge and resentment—and discuss their advantages and disadvantages. Then we focus on the forgiver's mind‐set, pointing to the relationship between forgiveness and acceptance of the wrong, addressing the forgiver's motivating goals, and discussing both their self‐interested and altruistic implications. In so doing we also discuss the role of the forgiver's positive feelings towards the offender, arguing that, however important, they are unnecessary to forgiveness. We finally identify two kinds of forgiveness—conditional and unconditional—suggesting that they are grounded on different notions of “worth.”

Forgiveness of Others and Self?Forgiveness: The Predictive Role of Cognitive Distortions, Empathy and Rumination

“…The essential thing for reaching emotional forgiveness is to reframe injured people's perceptions and thoughts about their hurtful experience, injurer, or themselves (Cioni, 2007;Thompson et al, 2005). Miceli and Castelfranchi (2011), who explored forgiveness within a cognitive and motivational context, underlined that an individual needs to reconstruct or reframe his or her cognitive schemas about agonizing hurtful experiences in order to forgive. Similarly, according to Gordon, Baucom, and Synder (2000), who have studied forgiveness from a cognitive approach, people need to explore the core beliefs and cognitive distortions of themselves to comprehend forgiveness.…”

Reconsidering the differences between shame and guilt

“… v To be more precise, a self-evaluation of responsible harmfulness is still insufficient for perceiving oneself as a wrongdoer and feeling guilty, because one should also perceive the “responsibly inflicted harm” as unjustified . A harm is perceived as justified either when it is done in order to favor the victim’s interests or when it is a punishment proper, that is, a commensurate response to a previous wrong committed by the victim ( Miceli & Castelfranchi, 2011 ). In the following, when speaking of self-evaluations of responsible harmfulness, we will presuppose that one also perceives the harm as unjustified.…”

Anger and Its Cousins

“…However, the previous definition is still incomplete, because a "responsibly inflicted harm" does not coincide with a wrong if it is perceived as justified-which occurs in the following cases: (a) when it is done in order to favor the victim's interests (for instance, A hurts B in order to prevent B from killing themself); (b) when it is a punishment proper, that is, a commensurate response to a previous wrong committed by the victim (Miceli & Castelfranchi, 2011). Therefore, for a "responsibly inflicted harm" to be a "wrong," it should be perceived as unjustified.…”

“…The resenter's suffering is twofold-for both the first-order harm and the second-order harm or offense received (Miceli & Castelfranchi, 2011). Because a wrong typically implies a firstorder harm, R's thwarted goals-goal p which has been frustrated by the first-order harm, and goal p 1 of not being a target of unjustified harm-are generally "fused" with each other.…”

“…As any creditor may choose to cancel a financial debt, so a victim may choose to cancel W's debt with him or her. Having come back to equal grounds, there is no longer any reason to feel retributive feelings and motivations (Miceli & Castelfranchi, 2011). Actually, forgiveness is a special way to resolve resentment and appease one's desire for revenge.…”