According to Cybernetic Control theories, negative emotions result when goal progress is thwarted and these emotions facilitate behavioural regulation (Carver & Scheier, 1998). Self-conscious emotions are recognized for their self-regulatory functions with guilt and shame being especially central to governing unhealthy behavior change (Dijkstra & Buunk, 2008). However limited research has explored the role of self-conscious emotions and exercise. In light of the concern about low physical activity rates among Canadians (Canadian Community Health Measures Survey, 2011) examining the role of guilt and shame in the self-regulation of exercise is warranted. Purpose. To examine the nature of guilt and shame related to recent exercise behavior. Procedures. In this online, observational study, 128 women and 47 men aged 18-64 (mean age 36, SD = 12.74) completed measures of recent physical activity, trait shame and guilt, exercise identity and demographics at baseline. On both a day when they did and did not engage in intended exercise, participants completed measures of recent exercise quantity and quality, exercise-related state shame and guilt, attributions (on the missed exercise day) and exercise intentions. Results. T-tests revealed that participants experienced more guilt and shame after a missed as opposed to an engaged-in intended exercise session, and that of these two emotions guilt was felt more intensely. Regression analyses determined that perceptions of exercise quality were negatively related to both guilt and shame, however these emotions were not related to exercise intentions. Guilt was associated with the attribution dimension of internal locus of casualty and shame with stability, but no relationships were found between the two emotions and exercise identity. Lastly, logistic regressions showed that shame, but not guilt, was associated with exercise behaviour with shame showing a negative relationship with behaviour. Findings add to the extant literature on the role of shame and guilt in exercise self-regulation.

This dissertation explored the subjective experience and neural correlates of self-conscious emotion (SCE) understanding in adolescent males with high-functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and age-matched neurotypical (NT) males (ages 11-17). Study I investigated group differences in SCE attributions (the ability to recognize SCEs conveyed by others) and empathic SCEs (the ability/tendency to feel empathic SCEs for others) in 56 adolescents (ASD = 30; NT = 26). It also explored associations between SCE processing and a triad of social cognitive abilities (self-awareness/introspection, perspective-taking/cognitive empathy, affective empathy) and autistic symptoms/traits. Study II investigated the neural correlates of SCE processing in 52 adolescents (ASD = 27; NT = 25). During an MRI scan, participants completed the Self-Conscious Emotions Task-Child, which included 24 salient, ecologically-valid videos of adolescents participating in a singing competition. Videos represented two factors: emotion (embarrassment, pride) and perspective-taking (PT) demands (low, high). In low PT clips, singers’ emotions matched their performance (sing poorly, act embarrassed); in high PT clips, they did not (sing well, act embarrassed). Participants used a 4-point Likert scale to rate how intensely embarrassed and proud singers felt. They made congruent ratings, which matched the conveyed emotions (rating how embarrassed an embarrassed singer felt), and incongruent ratings, which did not match the conveyed emotions (rating how proud an embarrassed singer felt). Outside the scanner, participants rated how empathically embarrassed and proud they felt for the singers. The ASD and NT groups made similarly intense inferred congruent and empathic congruent SCE ratings, suggesting that emotion attribution and affective empathy are intact in ASD. However, the ASD group made more intense inferred incongruent SCE ratings, suggesting that emotion attribution in ASD may be more strongly impacted by the situational context. An over-reliance on contextual cues may reflect a strict adherence to rule-following and serve as a compensatory strategy for attenuated mentalizing. Neuroimaging results support this interpretation. The ASD group recruited atypical neural patterns within social cognition regions, visual perception regions, salience regions, and sensorimotor regions. These findings similarly suggest an over-reliance on abstract social conceptual knowledge when processing discrepant affective and contextual cues. Implications for intervention are discussed. / 10000-01-01

Guilt theoretically functions to motivate reparative behaviors, which, in turn, theoretically function to alleviate guilt and prevent psychopathology. Although several empirical studies in adults have demonstrated that guilt and reparative behaviors function as theorized, research has not investigated causal relations between guilt and reparative behaviors in children. Thus, this study examined whether guilt motivates children’s reparative behaviors, and whether their reparative behaviors successfully alleviate guilty feelings. Six-to ten-year olds (N = 97) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions. In the experimental condition, children were led to believe that they had transgressed to cause a peer’s distress. Children self-reported their guilt feelings following the pretend transgression, and then had the opportunity to repair the transgression by giving stickers and writing a note to the victimized peer. Following the repair opportunity, children self-reported their guilt a second time. Children in the experimental condition (i.e., children who felt guilty) engaged in greater reparative behavior relative to children in a no-guilt condition who were led to believe that they had caused a peer’s positive emotions. Further, children in the experimental condition reported reduced guilt at the second measurement, whereas children in the no-repair condition (who were led to believe that they had transgressed but were not be given a repair opportunity) did not report reduced guilt over time. Results demonstrate that guilt and reparative behaviors function as theorized in children and may begin to inform reparative interventions aimed at preventing unalleviated, maladaptive guilt and psychopathology.

Athletic environments subject athletes to evaluation not only on performance, but also on appearance (Krane et al., 2001). This likely facilitates self-conscious emotions, which have a self-evaluative focus (Leary, 2004; Tracy & Robins, 2004). However, self-compassion might serve as a buffer against the self-conscious emotions by countering self-evaluative processes. The purpose of this study was to explore the relations between self-conscious emotions (i.e., shame, guilt, authentic pride, and hubristic pride) and self-evaluative thoughts and behaviours (i.e., social physique anxiety, obligatory exercise, objectified body consciousness, fear of failure, and fear of negative evaluation) for young women aged 13 -18 involved in high school sport (N = 151). The role of self-compassion as a moderator variable between self-conscious emotions and self-evaluative thoughts and behaviours was also explored. Consistent with the contention that shame and hubristic pride may be less adaptive than guilt and authentic pride, shame and hubristic pride showed positive relations with fear of failure (r = .26 and .20, respectively) and fear of negative evaluation (r = .21 and .21, respectively). Hubristic pride was also positively related to objectified body consciousness (r = .32). Conversely, guilt and authentic pride showed negative relations with objectified body consciousness (r = -.20 and -.34, respectively). Authentic pride also showed negative relations to fear of failure (r = -.38) and fear of negative evaluation (r = -.37). Self-compassion was negatively related to shame (r = -.32) and positively related to authentic pride (r = .42), but had no relation with guilt and hubristic pride. Self-compassion was also negatively related with social physique anxiety (r = -.39), objectified body consciousness (r = -.34), fear of failure (r = -.38), and fear of negative evaluation (r = -.37). Additionally, self-compassion was found to explain variance beyond self-esteem on objectified body consciousness (∆R2 = .07), fear of failure (∆R2 = .11), and fear of negative evaluation (∆R2 = .06). A significant interaction effect was found with self-compassion on the relation between shame and obligatory exercise, suggesting that even moderate levels of self-compassion may help to buffer some negative effects of shame. Taken together, these results suggest that self-compassion might be an important resource for young women involved in sport in managing self-conscious emotions.

Athletic environments subject athletes to evaluation not only on performance, but also on appearance (Krane et al., 2001). This likely facilitates self-conscious emotions, which have a self-evaluative focus (Leary, 2004; Tracy & Robins, 2004). However, self-compassion might serve as a buffer against the self-conscious emotions by countering self-evaluative processes. The purpose of this study was to explore the relations between self-conscious emotions (i.e., shame, guilt, authentic pride, and hubristic pride) and self-evaluative thoughts and behaviours (i.e., social physique anxiety, obligatory exercise, objectified body consciousness, fear of failure, and fear of negative evaluation) for young women aged 13 -18 involved in high school sport (N = 151). The role of self-compassion as a moderator variable between self-conscious emotions and self-evaluative thoughts and behaviours was also explored. Consistent with the contention that shame and hubristic pride may be less adaptive than guilt and authentic pride, shame and hubristic pride showed positive relations with fear of failure (r = .26 and .20, respectively) and fear of negative evaluation (r = .21 and .21, respectively). Hubristic pride was also positively related to objectified body consciousness (r = .32). Conversely, guilt and authentic pride showed negative relations with objectified body consciousness (r = -.20 and -.34, respectively). Authentic pride also showed negative relations to fear of failure (r = -.38) and fear of negative evaluation (r = -.37). Self-compassion was negatively related to shame (r = -.32) and positively related to authentic pride (r = .42), but had no relation with guilt and hubristic pride. Self-compassion was also negatively related with social physique anxiety (r = -.39), objectified body consciousness (r = -.34), fear of failure (r = -.38), and fear of negative evaluation (r = -.37). Additionally, self-compassion was found to explain variance beyond self-esteem on objectified body consciousness (∆R2 = .07), fear of failure (∆R2 = .11), and fear of negative evaluation (∆R2 = .06). A significant interaction effect was found with self-compassion on the relation between shame and obligatory exercise, suggesting that even moderate levels of self-compassion may help to buffer some negative effects of shame. Taken together, these results suggest that self-compassion might be an important resource for young women involved in sport in managing self-conscious emotions.

Background Shame is a powerful emotion involved in a wide variety of phenomena including psychopathology. The propensity to react with shame to situations of transgression is formed early in life, but the processes by which elevated shame-proneness causes higher levels of psychological distress and functional impairment in some people rather than in others is as yet poorly understood. Objectives The main objective of this thesis was to further elucidate these processes by investigating the implications for shame states, guilt, general coping strategies, attachment styles, and shame-related coping in this context, as well as to evaluate an assessment method for shame-proneness. Methods The self-report questionnaires Test of Self-Conscious Affect (TOSCA), Compass of Shame Scale (CoSS-5), Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ), Ways of Coping Questionnaire (WCQ), Attachment Style Questionnaire (ASQ), Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90), and an interview measure for event-related shame and guilt were used for assessment in adult normative, healthy-only, crime victim, and patient samples (n=25-361). A combination of uni- and bivariate approaches and multivariate soft and hard modeling approaches were used for statistical analysis. Results Paper I showed that the TOSCA could be used as a reliable measure for shame-proneness. Paper II showed that guilt was unrelated to post-victimization distress. Elevated shame-proneness was related to higher levels of post-victimization distress. This effect was partially mediated by event-related shame. Paper III showed that in CFS patients, higher levels of shame-proneness, escape-avoidance, and accepting responsibility coping contributed to elevated levels of psychological distress. Seeking support, positive reappraisal coping, and proneness to detachment contributed in the opposite direction. These relationships were weaker in the comparison groups. Paper IV showed that shame-proneness was associated with secure attachment style in a negative direction. Higher levels of secure attachment style contributed to lower levels of psychological distress, whereas shame-proneness, insecure attachment styles and withdrawal, attack self, and attack other shame coping strategies contributed in the opposite direction. There were mean differences between women and men regarding most of the variables, butiithe relationships between variables did not differ between men and women. Conclusions The association between shame-proneness and psycho-logical distress seem to involve a complex balancing act between motives toward preserving close relationships and protecting a relatively positive sense of self. If others are perceived as trustworthy and compassionate and are utilized for support in times of need, the effects of shame-proneness may be less debilitating, whereas if others are perceived as distancing or disapproving, and life stress and social transgressions are managed by escape strategies, social withdrawal, self-blame or by transferring blame onto others, the distress effects become more severe. The inner psychodynamics of these functional patterns seem to be rather similar in women and men.

Although the overall quantity of international research has increased, existent studies tend to adopt an instrument developed in one culture to use in the other, leading to measurement bias. In addition, previous cross-cultural research mainly focuses on comparisons between collectivist and individualistic backgrounds (e.g., American vs. Chinese) without considering the similarities and differences within the collectivist societies (e.g., China vs. Mexico). This dissertation project has two purposes, with Study 1 aiming to examine measurement equivalence of two widely used instruments while Study 2 investigating if an attachment-based two-serial mediation model remained constant among three cross-cultural samples collected from the US, Mexico, and China. A total of 1211 participants, including 360 American university students, 441 Mexican students, and 410 Chinese students participated in the study. Differential item functioning (DIF) in lordif package in R and structural equation modeling (SEM) in Mplus 8.1 were adopted for Study 1 and 2, respectively. The results of Study 1 indicated the proposed instruments were culturally invariant in English, Spanish, and Chinese with some modifications. Study 2 showed that assertiveness/self-conscious emotions mediated the association between adult attachment and depression/aggression only in the US group. However, the two-serial mediation model in which the link between adult attachment and depression/aggression via assertiveness to self-conscious emotions was supported in Mexican and Chinese groups, not in the US group. Findings from these two cross-cultural adult attachment studies provide additional insights for future attachment research and useful implications for psychologists working with diverse individuals from the US, Mexico, and China.

Parents play an important role in socializing children's emotion understanding. Previous research on parents' conversations with their children shows that parents emphasize different aspects of emotion contexts depending on the emotion depicted. However, there is limited research on how parents and children discuss self-conscious emotions, such as embarrassment, guilt, and shame. The current study explored the socialization of self-conscious emotions in parent-child conversations during a storybook task. One hundred and sixty-six children between the ages of 24 and 36 months were observed reading a storybook with their parent. Analyses of parent-child conversations revealed that while parent and child utterances were highly correlated, only parents differentially discussed different aspects of each self-conscious emotion. Additionally, the frequency of parents' causality and knowledge-based questions directed towards their children differed by self-conscious emotion. Whether parent communication of emotion serves as a framework for child understanding and interpretation of self-conscious emotions will be discussed.

The present study examined the role of emotion regulation (ER) in individuals who endorsed social anxiety symptoms found in taijin kyofusho (TKS) and social anxiety disorder (SAD) in a young adult sample. More specifically, the study sought to examine the role of self-conscious emotions of shame and embarrassment with respect to TKS and SAD. Participants were administered a series of questionnaires during the first phase of the study and, during the second phase, a diagnostic clinical interview and additional questionnaires were administered along with an experimental social evaluative task and recording of electrical cardiac impulses. Descriptively, social anxiety symptoms were expected to be associated with less adaptive ER strategies. Additionally, differences between individuals who endorsed TKS and SAD symptoms were expected such that TKS would be associated more so with shame and SAD with embarrassment. It was hypothesized that ER would mediate the relationship between embarrassment and shame and their hypothesized anxiety counterparts (SAD or TKS). Findings revealed an association between shame and TKS, and embarrassment and SAD. However, less adaptive ER strategies were not related to social anxiety symptoms and ER did not mediate the relationship between self-conscious emotions and social anxiety. The present findings suggest that shame and embarrassment can play a role in the clinical manifestations of SAD and TKS. Implications regarding the role of these emotions and ER were examined. / Ph. D.

In modern times, there is an increasing tendency to use "us versus them" rhetoric in the political realm. Motivated reasoning literature offers a solution as to how group conflict contributes to outgroup bias. People may develop negative feelings towards outgroups in order to reduce cognitive dissonance and feel better about their judgments. Nevertheless, this is not the situation for everyone. My research aims to understand how peoples’ predisposed tendencies may affect the level of their out-group bias. Drawing from the distinction between shame (a negative sense of identity) and guilt (a response to a specific behavior) in psychology, I hypothesized that self-conscious emotions would moderate the relationship between information about in-group transgressions and out-group bias. To test this, I conducted a survey experiment with three different groups: Men/Women, White/Black people, and Democrats/Republicans. Participants were randomly assigned to watch videos depicting misbehavior from their respective group. Results showed that the proneness to self-conscious emotions did moderate the relationship to some extent, although the connection between shame and guilt proneness was more complex than anticipated. Criticizing one's in-group generally caused people to experience cognitive dissonance and reinforced out-group bias, particularly among those who were highly prone to both shame and guilt. The three-way interaction between treatment, shame proneness, and guilt proneness varied across and within the different identity categories, suggesting that there is no single theory that can entirely explain the degree of out-group bias. / Political Science