Forgiveness and the Need to Belong

Abstract

People who experience a strong need to belong might be particularly inclined to forgive wrongdoings to preserve social bonds. Three studies that utilized different methods and measures of forgiveness consistently demonstrated this is not the case. The authors found that individuals high in the need to belong report practicing forgiveness with less frequency and value it no more than those low in the need to belong (Study 1). In Study 2, they found that satisfying the need to belong led participants to express greater willingness to forgive hypothetical offenses compared to participants in a control group. Finally, in Study 3, the authors linked the need to belong to forgiveness of specific transgressions and found that this negative relationship was mediated by offense-related anger and perceptions of offense severity. These findings suggest that needing to belong paradoxically interferes with forgiveness, even though forgiving could promote the satisfaction of belongingness needs following transgressions. Although we might wish sometimes to exchange our fractured and damaged relationships for better functioning ones, the reality is that dropping one relationship to pick up another of the same depth and quality is not a quick or easy process. The going often gets tough in human relationships. If people responded to all interpersonal conflicts by ending their relationships to start over with new ones, they would be in a perpetual state of seeking belongingness but never experiencing it, and this would run counter to the fundamental need to belong that animates much human behavior (Baumeister & Leary, 1995). What, then, are people to do in the face of relational difficulties? One solution is to offer forgiveness to wrongdoers. Although forgiveness is not tantamount to reconciliation (McCullough, Pargament, & Thoresen, 2000), it is one link in the chain of relationship restoration, and in a world where close, fulfilling social bonds are not always easy or possible to come by, people might find it worthwhile to forgive wrongdoers to meet their need for interpersonal connectedness.The idea that a positive association between the need to belong and forgiveness should exist seems intuitive. Nevertheless, empirical support for such a link is lacking in the psychological literature, and the extant research on related topics suggests that the need to belong might make preserving relationships that have been abused by transgressions especially difficult and unlikely. The purpose of this article, therefore, is to take an initial foray into the study of how the need to belong relates to interpersonal forgiveness by addressing a few basic questions on the topic using different methods and measures. In the following sections we discuss the theory of the need to belong and then explore evidence that points to how this motive might relate to forgiveness to set the stage for our own investigations. Need to Belong: Theory and ResearchThere are many things in life that we can do without: designer jeans, fried foods, celebri...

Personally committed to emotional labor: Surface acting, emotional exhaustion and performance among service employees with a strong need to belong.

“…In the interest of triangulation (e.g., Campbell & Fiske, 1959; Sackett & Larson, 1990), we used different measures of need to belong in the two studies. In Study 1, we used a scale of need to belong (Leary et al, 2013), which measures both the desire for belongingness and worry about experiences that connote a lack of acceptance (Barnes, Carvallo, Brown, & Osterman, 2010). In Study 2, we used a scale of fear of isolation that measures emotional responses associated with real or potential rejection (Hayes et al, 2013).…”

Sabotaging the deal: The way relational concerns undermine negotiators

“…This study connects to that line of work, but extends it in three important ways. First, we focused on belongingness needs, thought to be fundamental to human beings, and whose impact has been documented across a range of contexts (Barnes, Carvallo, Brown, & Osterman, 2010;Bastian & Haslam, 2010;Gardner et al, 2000). Second, we pinpointed the mechanism that drives the effects of belongingness on negotiators' economic outcomes.…”

Investigation of the Correlation between Belonging Needs of Students Attending University and Well-being

“…Carvallo and Gabriel (10) in their study revealed that those with dismissive bonding style felt the need for acceptance by others and belonging. Additionally, individuals with high need to belong may have an anxious bonding style [12]. The need to belong was also found to be related to perfectionism expected of themselves and others, shyness [11], reputation [13], self-talk, loneliness [14], mental health [15], social inhibition, internalizing problems [16], tendency to forgive, self-esteem [12], life satisfaction [14], narcissism [17] and well-being [18].…”