16.1 Guilt
All of the participants talked about
guilt in the interviews. Guilt is mentioned 168 times in the interviews
(appendix 4), however, it is surpassed by; shame (293 times), body (225 times),
the Incest Centre (224 times) and self-image (186 times). Since guilt and shame
seem to be highly correlated (table 7), I anticipated that the number of
references to guilt would only be exceeded by references to the concept of
shame in the interviews.
How do the participants describe the
concept and phenomenon of guilt? Do the participants understand shame and guilt
to be the same emotion or as two distinctly different emotions? If they are
related, how is this expressed? The participants in this study reflect upon
these and other questions. Ivar says that he feels shame and embarrassment in
relation to the abuse he suffered as a child, but that he does not feel any
guilt. He sees shame and guilt as two distinctly different emotions.
Ivar: Well, I don’t feel any guilt with regard to the abuse I’ve experienced;
shameful and embarrassed, yes, ((Nods his head)) but not guilt ((Shakes his head)).
Ivar was sexually abused by several
perpetrators, both men and women, in his childhood. He describes the abuse he
suffered as torture, and knows that the abusers are guilty, even though they
were never reported to the police nor imposed a jail sentence. Guilt is more
than being found guilty by a judge in a courtroom. Guilt is also a moral
feeling produced because of a wrong doing. Ivar does not feel guilt, but he
feels shame and embarrassment. Many researchers agree with Ivar that guilt and
shame are two distinct emotions and that an important difference between them
is in the degree of focus on the self (Lewis 1971; Tangney 1998; Eisenberg
2000). When a person experiences shame, the entire self can feel itself
exposed, inferior, and degraded. Adults report that shame experiences are more
painful and intense than guilt experiences and are associated with a
preoccupation with the opinions of others. In contrast, guilt is generally less
painful and devastating because, when one experiences guilt, the primary
concern is with a particular behavior which does not involve the self (Ferguson
et al. 1991, 1997, 1999; Tangney 1998). The person who feels guilt accepts
responsibility for a behavior that violates internalized standards or causes
another’s distress and desires to make amends or punish the self (Ferguson and
Stegge 1998; Hoffman 1998; Tangney 1991) regardless of whether they are guilty
or not, and a person can be guilty without feeling guilt (Leer-Salvesen 1991).
Even though Ivar can distinguish
between guilt and shame, others experience that the two emotions are related. Sally
says that shame is related to guilt in a way. If one first feels guilt and responsibility
for a wrongdoing, the result can be shame.
Sally: I think shame is something that comes after guilt.
Showing oneself as a wrong doer
might be a presentation of oneself which conflicts with ones self-image, and
this might result in a feeling of shame. But it might also be possible that the
first feeling of guilt which Sally speaks of, in reality is shame which she has
defined as guilt. It might be that shame is so shameful to acknowledge, that it
instead is defined as guilt. The illusion of guilt might diminish over time so
that the underlying feeling of shame becomes uncovered. Grainger (1991) asks
whether shame can be guilt in disguise, for example that shame can be viewed as
the little boy or girl who resides inside each and every one of us and who
feels shame but calls it guilt. We have all been children and a part of us will
always remain child-like, still seeking to have its needs met. Is the feeling
of shame we have as adults really the same as the feeling of guilt we had as
children because we did not live up to the expectations of our parents? This is
a possible explanation in some cases, but I believe Pia to be right when she argues
that guilt a feeling one feels after doing something wrong as a child. Shame and
guilt were easier to distinguish from each other in childhood years.
Distinguishing between them as an adult is much more complicated.
Pia: Guilt? I think of a lot of episodes when I was smaller and did naughty
things. I remember breaking a cellar window. I knew it was wrong. But the
people who lived there, they weren’t fond of kids. So we fought back. We knew
afterwards that we had done something wrong. (.) That’s what I remember as a child, it was much easier to know the
difference between shame and guilt when I was a child than as a grownup…They
overlap much more now.
Pia argues that there are two forms
of guilt, doing something wrong and being guilty and the feeling of guilt. Baumeister,
Stillwell and Heatherton (1995) argue that there are, as Pia indicates, two
forms of guilt. One form of guilt can be seen as a mechanism that alters
behavior in the service of maintaining good interpersonal relationships between
long-term partners. Feeling guilty can be associated with higher rates of
lesson learning, changing subsequent behavior, apologizing, confessing
transgressions, and recognizing how a relationship partner’s standards and
expectations differ from one’s own. Inducing guilt can therefore be an
effective way of influencing the behavior of relationship partners. The other
form of guilt develops as we become a part of society and conform to society’s
rules. This makes it complicated to explain guilt. These rules may differ in
various countries and in different societies within our own country. The rules
of society may differ from Northern Norway and Southern
Norway, between village in the country side and in larger urban
areas, or even within different parts of a city. Several participants in the
interviews also reflect this difficulty. Camilla says that guilt can be
forgiven while Helga wonders who made
her feel guilty. Dagny says guilt comes from doing something wrong and shame
comes after feeling guilt; shame is thus both a cause and an effect of doing
something wrong. Ellen has a bad conscience for everything and nothing; she says
that she uses the word guilt even though she feels shame. They show the many
different faces guilt can have, but they agree that it has to do with doing
something wrong.
Camilla: Guilt
is something that can be forgiven
Dagny: Guilt
is in a way, how can I explain? (.) In
a way, something I’ve done, that I can be guilty of. Shame is a cause, an
effect, of doing something wrong. That was weird. Well, guilt is umm one feels
guilty about what one has done, while shame is something that comes afterwards,
after feeling guilt.
Camilla: But
what about me? I still feel guilt about something I’m not guilty of. If I feel
that I deserve to feel good, then I have to work on that in order to do
something about my shame. I have to work with my feeling of guilt.
Ellen: I have a lot of guilt feelings. I feel that a lot. A bad conscience for
everything. For everything and nothing. I can feel shame in some situations…but
I use the word guilt.
Helga: I
often wonder about the fact that there must have been someone who gave me this
feeling of guilt.
Ellen says that she has a lot of
guilt feelings and that the shame she feels is something she also calls guilt.
She seems to characterize them as a single emotion. Harris (2003) has carried
out a study in order to examine whether theoretical distinctions between shame
and guilt can be empirically supported. The expected distinctions between shame
and guilt were not found in this study; instead shame and guilt seemed to occur
as a single emotion. The results could suggest that shame and guilt are
emotions that are indistinguishable in some scenarios. In response to a
wrongdoing, an individual might have a certain amount of guilt that is focused
upon their actions, but they would also experience a certain degree of negative
self-evaluation and shame. Harris (2003) argues that in many contexts both
emotions will occur and will be in proportional intensity. Keeping guilt and
shame from each other is a difficult matter in some situations. Olga explains
that she does not know the difference between shame and guilt; she only knows
that she has a lot of both. Pia also explains how complicated it becomes to see
the difference between shame and guilt, especially because she blames herself
for the wrongdoing and everything seems related.
Olga: I have an example (.) of just
that (.) umm I felt very guilty when
my mother died. I was seven then. Later on when I started to work on that guilt
feeling as an adult, I found out that I felt shame about not having a mother.
It was both. ((Lifts up both hands and waves them back and forth)). I tried to keep them apart, but that wasn’t
easy…It involved shame because she wasn’t there anymore, and because we didn’t
have the things that other children had. We didn’t have the same clothes, we
didn’t always have someone to look after us (.) things like that, and we didn’t always have food or good food, and
there were things we lacked that are natural for children to have…We felt both
guilt and shame, but what’s what? I remember struggling a lot with that.
((Looks at the other three)) (.) I really
did, also after becoming an adult. I still don’t know the difference. What’s
what? I just know I have a lot of both ((Nods her head)). I have both of them inside of me.
Pia: A lot of people say that
everything takes time; we have to talk about it, and it becomes smaller and
smaller. And I believe it’s so. But when they’ve placed the blame somewhere and
it’s not my fault. The person who had the responsibility was to blame, and then
shame is easier to work with. But when you don’t know who’s responsible and
feel you are to blame ((Points to her chest)) and the shame, then everything seems related. It becomes chaotic. If
you get it out, it’s much easier to work with the shame. Talk about it and get
it out. ((Moves her hand from her mouth and outwards).
Olga and Pia argue that shame and
guilt share a number of important features and that are difficult to keep apart
as different emotions. Lewis (1995a, 1995b, 2000) explains that both shame and
guilt are self-conscious emotions; they involve self-referential processes that
apply to some standard of the self or behavior. Tangney (1995) argues that
shame and guilt are both negatively valenced emotions that typically arise in
response to some personal failure or transgression, and says that the kinds of
events that give rise to shame and guilt are remarkably similar. Lewis (1971)
argues that both emotions involve the internal attribution of negative
self-relevant events. I agree that guilt and shame have much in common, but
still there seems to be a clear difference in that guilt has to having done
something wrong while shame has to do with ones self-image. The focus of guilt
is outwards, while the focus of shame is inwards. In some situations these will
overlap. Doing something wrong causes a feeling of guilt for the fault committed,
and if one feels that one has damaged ones self-image in the blunder, then
shame also is induced. Ellen, Helga and Gunhild discuss the guilt they felt as
children.
One of the participants, Ellen,
brings forth what is for me a new concept; being “guilt-injured” (skyldskada), meaning in my opinion that
one can become sick from ones feeling of guilt. She was given the blame for her
father’s drinking problems and for his cancer. This is en enormous responsibility
for a child to be given, and when it becomes intolerable, agony and suffering may
develop into a sickness. She does not say what kind of sickness or injury guilt
may induce. But Ellen herself is disabled; psychological immobilized and
physically powerless, because of the suffering she experienced in her
childhood. Ellen and Helga have had the same experience of being given the
responsibility for their parent’s cancer. Helga was blamed her mother’s cancer
and for not being the child her mother had hoped for. Gunhild also was given
the responsibility for her mother’s schizophrenia. Being blamed by others
created self-blame and they felt, and still feel, an enormous guilt. Gunhild
says that guilt is sometimes so devastating that she cannot live with it.
Ellen: People become guilt-injured and can even get sick from it…When I was
eight I was blamed for my father’s drinking problems; I was guilty of causing
his alcohol problems.
Helga: Jesus.
I heard that it was my fault that my mother got cancer.
Ellen: Me too when my father got cancer.
Gunhild: I
have an enormous feeling of guilt about my mother. She was real sick. She had
schizophrenia. I was the cause, it was my fault. Even if she dies, I’ll always
feel guilt. And I really believed that it was my fault. I was ten when I felt
guilty for this the first time. And ever since, I’ve felt guilt every time my
mother was ill. She was ill because of me. It’s been difficult to live with. I
can’t live with it. I was never the little girl my mother wanted… I feel awfully
guilty about my mother.
Helga: Because
you weren’t the girl she had hoped for?
Gunhild: Yeah.
I feel really guilty about that. I’ve made her life so difficult. I can’t even
give her a call or send her a postcard. I should have given her so much. But I
can’t. I pity her and it hurts to see that she’s in so much pain ((Looks
down)) and she has experienced so much.
Helga: I’ve
felt guilt all (.) my life, but I’ve
started to think that Christ, you just can’t give a little child the blame for
umm (.)
Taylor (1985) argues, like Ellen, Helga
and Gunhild, that guilt is an emotion of self-judgment. Both guilt and shame
are about our selves; about who we are and also about what we do. We often do
not make precise distinctions when we think about these emotions. We are likely
to say that we are ashamed of something that we have done and say that we feel
guilty about what we have done. We might also say that we feel embarrassed.
However, all of these emotions indicate a process of self-judgement of our character
or our actions, or both. Stempsey (2004) argues that the emotions of
self-judgement provide us with a means of evaluating ourselves. Evaluation is a
comparison of how things are with how things ought to be. For this reason, both
guilt and shame are usually recognized as moral concepts.
Ruth explains the massive guilt felt
by those who judge themselves as responsible for the abuse they have
participated in. She gives an example of a user, who experienced pleasure in
the sexual abuse, but still knowing that the actions were wrong and guilt
inducing. This may seem as a paradox. Living in such a contradiction can be
devastating and difficult to bring to an end. Sexual abuse is usually
considered as morally wrong, physically and psychologically painful for the victim,
and resulting in a vast number of negative outcomes.
Ruth_1: Many
adults give their children the responsibility for and feelings of guilt about
the abuse…They carry a feeling of guilt umm ((Rubs her hands together)) I can give quite a few examples of women
here in conversations who say that they have had some pleasure (.) while being abused when they’d grown a bit
older. (.) Umm ((Looks up at the
ceiling)) Today they judge themselves (.)
horribly; one of them says it’s because
she hasn’t said anything about the abuse to anyone. She’s still being abused
and she’s over 30. (.) Umm and she
judges herself so harshly...she hasn’t said anything and feels guilty, she’s
guilty of still living with the abuse…She feels that she’s part of the abuse.
She’s guilty of the abuse.
Considering sexual abuse as
something pleasurable is challenging to the established view of sexual abuse.
The example given by Ruth is in my opinion important to reflect upon. People
can be abused and not be able to escape out of the relationship and being able
to live, because one might lack the will to break out of the relationship or
because the feeling og guilt is so incredible that it becomes paralyzing. Margaret
on the other hand says that she feels no guilt in connection to the abuse she
has suffered, but she feels shame and her shame lies in her body. She wants to
be herself, not her body.
Margaret: It’s
shame. I don’t feel guilt ((Shakes her head)) for what happened, what they did to me. But I really feel an enormous
shame. No. I know that it wasn’t my fault ((Dries away tears from both
cheeks)). I know who is guilty but my
body ((Dries her hands on her laps)) (.) now and then is not mine. If
I could choose, then I wouldn’t want it. It’s a body. I want to be me. Not my
body.
The way I read Margaret here is that
she does not seem to have done anything wrong when she was sexually abused and or
when she later placed the blame on her two perpetrators. This is something that
Ivar and Knut agree with and argue that guilt has to do with doing something
wrong.
Ivar_1: ((Coughs)) (.) Guilt, that umm, has something to do umm with doing something wrong.
Knut: I think of guilt and being guilty as doing something wrong
intentionally. If you do something wrong, you’re in a way guilty. If you haven’t
done anything wrong, you’re not guilty. I don’t know. But I think that sounds
ok.
Knut underlines the fact that guilt
has to do not only in doing something wrong, but the wrongdoing has to be
intentional. Feeling guilt for an accidental mistake is irrational. Knut brings
in the element of intend. In my opinion he might be correct speaking judicially.
If one is found insane at the time of the crime, it is possible to be found not
guilty by a court decision. The action is then not done intentionally in a
sound mind. But psychologically, in my opinion, an irrational guilt may still
torment the person through self-blaming with the extra feeling of not being
able to expiate the wrong doing. This ending up sometimes in self-suffering and
lacking the will to forgive oneself for the unintentional transgression.
In this section, guilt is described
as an emotion that seems to be closely related to shame. Both are
self-conscious emotions concerned with the self-judgement of wrongdoing. They
often seem to overlap and are sometimes impossible to keep apart. This seems
especially true when children feel they are to blame for a wrongdoing and over
time this has a negative effect on their self-evaluation, resulting in shame.
The two emotions thus seem then to become one. Guilt can also be seen as
distinct from shame because it focuses on the wrongdoing, while shame focuses
on the wrong-doer. The difference between the two emotions seems to have to do
with the degree of self-evaluation. Another difference seems to be that guilt
can have several positive functions in holding relationships together, while
shame arises out of a threat to relational bonds or the severance of such
bonds. This section seems to support the assumption that guilt and shame can be
seen both as different emotions and as the same emotion. This seems to depend
on several factors; age, situation, personal attributes, degree of negative
self-evaluation, and the possibility of emotional disclosure. When emotions are
enclosed instead of disclosed, and shame is silenced, anger seems to develop. I
will take a closer look at anger in the next section and explore its
relationship to shame.
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