Attachment, psychosocial development, shame, guilt, and forgiveness /
Undergraduate students from Texas A&M University described in writing an incident in which their trust was betrayed by an attachment figure. Self-report measures of forgiveness, defensive style, shame, and guilt-proneness, social desirability, trait anxiety, trait anger, attachment style, and ps...
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| Format: | Thesis Book |
| Language: | English |
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[Place of publication not identified] :
[publisher not identified] ;
1999.
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://proxy.library.tamu.edu/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=730298191&sid=1&Fmt=2&clientId=2945&RQT=309&VName=PQD |
| Summary: | Undergraduate students from Texas A&M University described in writing an incident in which their trust was betrayed by an attachment figure. Self-report measures of forgiveness, defensive style, shame, and guilt-proneness, social desirability, trait anxiety, trait anger, attachment style, and psychosocial resolution were also administered. The current study provides moderate support for an attachment-psychosocial model of forgiveness. Specifically, the results showed that securely attached individuals described themselves as more forgiving than their insecure counterparts. In addition, secure attachment, measured continuously, emerged as a significant, positive predictor of intrinsic forgiveness, and insecure attachment materialized as a significant positive presider of non-intrinsic forgiveness. Victim ratings of reparation attempts by offenders also emerged as a significant predictor of intrinsic forgiveness. These results suggest that successful forgiveness is facilitated both by intrapsychic factors such as trust and empathy as well as by interpersonal factors such as reparation attempts. Results supported theories, connecting difficulties in forgiving with defensiveness and shame-proneness. Healthy psychosocial development also materialized as a positive predictor of intrinsic forgiveness, and unhealthy psychosocial development proved to be a positive predictor of non-intrinsic forgiveness. An exploration of the relationship between attachment and psychosocial development revealed that, whereas attachment security was predicted positively by positive psychosocial development, attachment insecurity was predicted positively by negative psychosocial development. These results support previous speculation concerning the complementary nature of the attachment and Eriksonian paradigms. The study also found that healthy psychosocial development was positively predicted by guilt, mature and neurotic defense style, and secure attachment and was negatively predicted by shame and an immature defense style. These results support Erikson's contention that positive psychosocial development is characterized by a non-defensive trust. The emergence of guilt as a positive predictor demonstrates its utility as a metric of prosocial attitudes, closely related to empathy, trust, and a willingness to forgive. |
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| Item Description: | Vita. "Major Subject: Psychology". |
| Physical Description: | xii, 161 leaves : illustrations ; 28 cm. Issued also on microfiche from University Microfilm Inc. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (leaves 140-158). |