Although forgiveness is a broad psychological construct of increasing interest, the majority of research has focused on forgiveness of another person for a specific transgression. Independent of other dimensions of forgiveness, self-forgiveness has been significantly associated with health and well-being. Many dimensions of forgiveness share common definitional components; however, due to conceptual differences based on the self as both the offender and the offended, a distinct definition of self-forgiveness is necessary. Indeed, definition and resultant measurement-related limitations have likely slowed the progression of research on self-forgiveness, including understanding the role of self-forgiveness in the promotion of health and well-being and the role of self-forgiveness in facilitating treatment itself. A comprehensive literature review was conducted revealing 177 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles focused on the psychology of self-forgiveness. Of those 177 articles, 85 (48.02%) contained explicit definition-based information regarding self-forgiveness as a particular construct, from which 5 key distinctive definitional components were identified: reconciliation, acceptance, accountability, human-connectedness, and changecommitment. A comprehensive and accessible definition of self-forgiveness is proposed based on a consensus of the scientific peer-reviewed psychological literature. In addition, implications of a consensus definition for more effective assessment and treatment are discussed.

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Forgiveness research has seldom been directed toward alcohol use, misuse, and abuse. To date, forgiveness research in the realm of alcohol use, misuse, and abuse has focused on interpersonal consequences (e.g., Lin, Mack, Enright, Krahn, & Baskin, 2005; Scherer, Worthington, Hook, Campana, West, & Gartner, 2009; Worthington, Scherer, & Cooke, 2006), but has paid minimal attention to intrapersonal consequences. Psychologists today are just beginning to explore the complex and murky waters of self-forgiveness (or lack of it) and the alcohol misuser (e.g., Webb, Robinson, Brower, & Zucker, 2006). In the current dissertation, I review the literature on self-forgiveness, drinking refusal self-efficacy, and alcohol misuse. To explore this phenomena, I created a four-hour self-forgiveness intervention based off Worthington’s (2005) REACH model and motivational interviewing techniques (Miller & Rollnick, 2002). I then conducted the study utilizing a waitlist design with a sample of participants (N = 38) undergoing a routine alcohol rehabilitation protocol in one of two mental health centers in Michigan. The four-hour intervention delivered over three group therapy sessions was found to significantly promote reported levels of self-forgiveness, drinking refusal self-efficacy, and significantly decrease feelings of state guilt and state shame over an alcohol-related offense. I attempt to illustrate the necessity and practicality of the current research in standard addiction treatment. I then discuss in detail the self-forgiveness intervention tailored for alcohol misusing populations and discuss the results. Finally, I will provide a general discussion of the results of the self-forgiveness intervention and how the findings relate to the current body of literature.

Insofar as forgiveness of oneself enables one to responsibly manage the consequences of wrongdoing, the practice of self-forgiveness may be essential to the preservation of one’s physical, psychological, relational, and spiritual health. In the present thesis, an intervention wait-list design was employed to investigate the efficacy of a 6-hour self-directed workbook designed to promote self-forgiveness. University students (N = 204) who reported perpetrating an interpersonal offense and who experienced some sense of remorse were randomly assigned to either an immediate treatment or wait-list control condition, and assessments were administered on three occasions. Participants’ self-forgiveness ratings increased in conjunction with completion of the workbook, and the effect of treatment depended upon self-administered dose and baseline levels of dispositional self-compassion in some cases. In summary, the workbook appeared to facilitate the process of responsible self-forgiveness among perpetrators of interpersonal wrongdoing, though replication trials are needed in which lower rates of attrition reduce the possibility of biased results.

Book Summary: The present volume is a ground-breaking and agenda-setting investigation of the psychology of self-forgiveness. It brings together the work of expert clinicians and researchers working within the field, to address questions such as: Why is self-forgiveness so difficult? What contexts and psychological experiences give rise to the need for self-forgiveness? What approaches can therapists use to help people process difficult experiences that elicit guilt, shame and self-condemnation? How can people work through their own failures and transgressions? Assembling current theories and findings, this unique resource reviews and advances our understanding of self-forgiveness, and its potentially critical function in interpersonal relationships and individual emotional and physical health. The editors begin by exploring the nature of self-forgiveness. They consider its processes, causes, and effects, how it may be measured, and its potential benefits to theory and psychotherapy. Expert clinicians and researchers then examine self-forgiveness in its many facets; as a response to guilt and shame, a step toward processing transgressions, a means of reducing anxiety, and an essential component of, or, under some circumstances a barrier to, psychotherapeutic intervention. Contributors also address self-forgiveness as applied to diverse psychosocial contexts such as addiction and recovery, couples and families, healthy aging, the workplace, and the military. Among the topics in the Handbook: An evolutionary approach to shame-based self-criticism, self-forgiveness and compassion. Working through psychological needs following transgressions to arrive at self-forgiveness. Self-forgiveness and health: a stress-and-coping model. Self-forgiveness and personal and relational well-being. Self-directed intervention to promote self-forgiveness. Understanding the role of forgiving the self in the act of hurting oneself. The Handbook of the Psychology of Self-Forgiveness serves many healing professionals. It covers a wide range of problems for which individuals often seek help from counselors, clergy, social workers, psychologists and physicians. Research psychologists, philosophers, and sociologists studying self-forgiveness will also find it an essential handbook that draws together the advances made over the past several decades, and identifies important directions for the road ahead.

Book Summary: The present volume is a ground-breaking and agenda-setting investigation of the psychology of self-forgiveness. It brings together the work of expert clinicians and researchers working within the field, to address questions such as: Why is self-forgiveness so difficult? What contexts and psychological experiences give rise to the need for self-forgiveness? What approaches can therapists use to help people process difficult experiences that elicit guilt, shame and self-condemnation? How can people work through their own failures and transgressions? Assembling current theories and findings, this unique resource reviews and advances our understanding of self-forgiveness, and its potentially critical function in interpersonal relationships and individual emotional and physical health. The editors begin by exploring the nature of self-forgiveness. They consider its processes, causes, and effects, how it may be measured, and its potential benefits to theory and psychotherapy. Expert clinicians and researchers then examine self-forgiveness in its many facets; as a response to guilt and shame, a step toward processing transgressions, a means of reducing anxiety, and an essential component of, or, under some circumstances a barrier to, psychotherapeutic intervention. Contributors also address self-forgiveness as applied to diverse psychosocial contexts such as addiction and recovery, couples and families, healthy aging, the workplace, and the military. Among the topics in the Handbook: An evolutionary approach to shame-based self-criticism, self-forgiveness and compassion. Working through psychological needs following transgressions to arrive at self-forgiveness. Self-forgiveness and health: a stress-and-coping model. Self-forgiveness and personal and relational well-being. Self-directed intervention to promote self-forgiveness. Understanding the role of forgiving the self in the act of hurting oneself. The Handbook of the Psychology of Self-Forgiveness serves many healing professionals. It covers a wide range of problems for which individuals often seek help from counselors, clergy, social workers, psychologists and physicians. Research psychologists, philosophers, and sociologists studying self-forgiveness will also find it an essential handbook that draws together the advances made over the past several decades, and identifies important directions for the road ahead.

Book Summary: The present volume is a ground-breaking and agenda-setting investigation of the psychology of self-forgiveness. It brings together the work of expert clinicians and researchers working within the field, to address questions such as: Why is self-forgiveness so difficult? What contexts and psychological experiences give rise to the need for self-forgiveness? What approaches can therapists use to help people process difficult experiences that elicit guilt, shame and self-condemnation? How can people work through their own failures and transgressions? Assembling current theories and findings, this unique resource reviews and advances our understanding of self-forgiveness, and its potentially critical function in interpersonal relationships and individual emotional and physical health. The editors begin by exploring the nature of self-forgiveness. They consider its processes, causes, and effects, how it may be measured, and its potential benefits to theory and psychotherapy. Expert clinicians and researchers then examine self-forgiveness in its many facets; as a response to guilt and shame, a step toward processing transgressions, a means of reducing anxiety, and an essential component of, or, under some circumstances a barrier to, psychotherapeutic intervention. Contributors also address self-forgiveness as applied to diverse psychosocial contexts such as addiction and recovery, couples and families, healthy aging, the workplace, and the military. Among the topics in the Handbook: An evolutionary approach to shame-based self-criticism, self-forgiveness and compassion. Working through psychological needs following transgressions to arrive at self-forgiveness. Self-forgiveness and health: a stress-and-coping model. Self-forgiveness and personal and relational well-being. Self-directed intervention to promote self-forgiveness. Understanding the role of forgiving the self in the act of hurting oneself. The Handbook of the Psychology of Self-Forgiveness serves many healing professionals. It covers a wide range of problems for which individuals often seek help from counselors, clergy, social workers, psychologists and physicians. Research psychologists, philosophers, and sociologists studying self-forgiveness will also find it an essential handbook that draws together the advances made over the past several decades, and identifies important directions for the road ahead.

Book Summary: The present volume is a ground-breaking and agenda-setting investigation of the psychology of self-forgiveness. It brings together the work of expert clinicians and researchers working within the field, to address questions such as: Why is self-forgiveness so difficult? What contexts and psychological experiences give rise to the need for self-forgiveness? What approaches can therapists use to help people process difficult experiences that elicit guilt, shame and self-condemnation? How can people work through their own failures and transgressions? Assembling current theories and findings, this unique resource reviews and advances our understanding of self-forgiveness, and its potentially critical function in interpersonal relationships and individual emotional and physical health. The editors begin by exploring the nature of self-forgiveness. They consider its processes, causes, and effects, how it may be measured, and its potential benefits to theory and psychotherapy. Expert clinicians and researchers then examine self-forgiveness in its many facets; as a response to guilt and shame, a step toward processing transgressions, a means of reducing anxiety, and an essential component of, or, under some circumstances a barrier to, psychotherapeutic intervention. Contributors also address self-forgiveness as applied to diverse psychosocial contexts such as addiction and recovery, couples and families, healthy aging, the workplace, and the military. Among the topics in the Handbook: An evolutionary approach to shame-based self-criticism, self-forgiveness and compassion. Working through psychological needs following transgressions to arrive at self-forgiveness. Self-forgiveness and health: a stress-and-coping model. Self-forgiveness and personal and relational well-being. Self-directed intervention to promote self-forgiveness. Understanding the role of forgiving the self in the act of hurting oneself. The Handbook of the Psychology of Self-Forgiveness serves many healing professionals. It covers a wide range of problems for which individuals often seek help from counselors, clergy, social workers, psychologists and physicians. Research psychologists, philosophers, and sociologists studying self-forgiveness will also find it an essential handbook that draws together the advances made over the past several decades, and identifies important directions for the road ahead.

Moral injury (MI) among military personnel is a harmful condition caused by perpetrating, failing to prevent, or witnessing atrocities that violate one's deeply held morals or values. The current study built on the existing literature by exploring predictors of MI, specifically trait self-forgiveness (TSF), state self-forgiveness (SSF), perceived social support (PSS), and causal attributions (CA) following potentially morally injurious experiences (PMIEs) in service members and veterans. Participants were 92 U.S. military service members and veterans. The main findings were that TSF and PSS were both significantly negatively associated with MI in bivariate and multivariate analyses. Further, TSF and PSS were examined as potential moderators of the relationship between PMIEs and MI, but these moderation analyses were not significant. Given that some studies provide evidence for different symptom profiles between categories of PMIEs (i.e., PMIE-Self, PMIE-Other, and PMIE-Betrayal), the relationship between the different categories and TSF were explored. Of the three PMIE types, only PMIE-Betrayal was a significant negative predictor of TSF. Finally, CA was explored as a potential mediator of the relationship between TSF and MI outcomes, but this mediation analysis was not significant. Limitations, directions for future research, and implications for clinical practice are included for discussion.