Does guilt make people enhance their relationships and avoid harmful acts? 

Is guilt an effective form of interpersonal influence? 

Who uses guilt, and is resentment a worthy cost? 

Guilt is a basic social phenomenon that occurs in interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships, and its significance varies depending on the context. Increasing both in intensity and commonality in the context of group relationships characterized by expectations, and it serves multiple functions.

In this review, Arlene Stillwell and Roy Baumeister evaluate multiple sets of empirical research findings on the topic of guilt. The literature reviews consist of empirical studies, primarily in social and personality psychology, some developmental research, and a recent review. Not including case studies, the goal is to understand guilt as an essentially social phenomenon and the ways it impacts the individuals going through these emotions, which can be positive and/or negative. Moreover, they argue that most instances of guilt continue to be clearly and essentially linked to interpersonal processes. 

The researcher’s argument follows the social science tradition reflected in symbolic interactionism, social learning theory, socialization theory, Sullivanian personality theory, Heideggerian phenomenology, and others that regard many intrapsychic phenomena as having interpersonal origins, and do not include the few articles on specifically sexual guilt. Guilt wasn’t a well-researched topic back in the ’80s, the Annual Review of Psychology contained no articles on guilt, and the volume indexes listed only three pages that mentioned the word. Ironically, even undergraduate textbooks on motivation devote little or no space to guilt. Apart from sex guilt and legal decision making, both of which involve technical definitions of guilt that may differ in important ways from moral and everyday guilt, the topic has been neglected. 

In terms of Interpersonal Approach in Prior Theory, the social nature and interpersonal origins of guilt have been affirmed, denied, and downplayed. Freud treated guilt as a personal conflict, saying that guilt was a weapon of the superego to influence the ego’s decisions. Even though later on, he claimed that the superego was an adaptation of the human organism to civilized life, which by definition includes group living and coexisting. Helen Block Lewis, Pierse and Singer, or even the behaviorist theory of guilt by Mosher, echo this sentiment, claiming that guilt is an internalized emotion of self-punishment with no connection to others. On the other hand, Rank, De Rivera, Horney, and Micelli, among others, present a different view on guilt, claiming that guilt, like many other emotional states, is based on interpersonal relationships and their regulation, that guilt is a type of social shame, and an effect of an implied offense against the group. This discrepancy is understandable when taking into account the circumstances in which these theories were created. Having this in mind, the accumulation of findings motivated theorists such as Zahn-Waxler and Kochanska, among others, to call for new conceptual work on guilt to replace outdated theories and to integrate recent empirical findings.

The results of this meta-research study show that Guilt serves three broad functions for relationships: 

• Relationship-enhancing patterns of behavior: Guilt helps reinforce communal norms that prescribe mutual concern, respect, and positive treatment when self-interest is absent.
• Interpersonal influence technique: Allows even a relatively powerless person to get his or her way.
• Redistribute emotional distress: After a transgression, the victim is presumably suffering while the transgressor has benefited. If the transgressor feels guilty, however, his or her enjoyment is diminished, and the transgressor’s guilt may make the victim feel better.

The definition of guilt is plagued by the fact that people use it in different and often conflicting ways, using Shame and Guilt interchangeably, even though they are distinct and distinguishable experiences.  Guilt concerns one particular action, in contrast to shame, which pertains to the entire self. This article is concerned with what makes people feel guilty and what that feeling or the motivation to avoid that feeling causes them to do. By guilt, we refer to an individual’s unpleasant emotional state associated with possible objections to their actions, inaction, circumstances, or intentions.

There’s also Guilt Without Transgression, where people report feeling guilty despite the absence of wrongdoing. These phenomena are of particular importance for understanding the boundaries of guilt and the link between guilt and behavior. Many of them point to a deeply ingrained preference for fairness and equity in interpersonal relations, and guilt may be one potent mechanism that motivates that preference. 

Empathy is one of the personality traits that correlates with Guilt, and proneness to guilt is empirically correlated with empathy, such that more empathic people are more likely to experience guilt than are less empathic people. 

Some of the Effects of Guilt are:

• Prosocial effects: Motivates people to make reparations or amends, or at least to apologize. 
• Antisocial effects: Avoidance. Some individuals, in their efforts to get rid of guilt, deny any relationship with the victimized, derogating the victim. 

In conclusion, Arlene S. and Roy B. argue that guilt is an important and pervasive phenomenon, being for many a constant and decisive factor in the way they manage their lives. The social dimension of guilt is not limited to socialization and the teaching of moral standards, but it seems to surge from a fundamental concern with communal relationships, and despite its unsavory reputation and aversiveness, may be valuable in helping people live together and maintain successful interpersonal relationships

In the Book Axiom Regalia: Fate of Hate, Zenton Yobera portrays Guilt as a powerful emotion with world-changing effects, not by eliminating it from one’s emotional spectrum but by accepting it as a core element in human experience. In His Novel, Guilt can transform us into demons, hurtful entities with not other purpose but to perpetuate the cycle of pain, but instead of destroying the demonic creature, Zenton brings the demons humanity to light, showing us that guilt isn’t just a demonic trait, but a human one, and in the process of accepting our demonic nature, and attempting to amend the relationships with the people we harmed we transcend, transforming us into powerful and unstoppable forces of good. 

Love is Revolution isn’t just a catchy phrase in Axiom Regalia: Fate of Hate, but a motto that drives every relationship and every action. The only thing that can free us from the shackles of hate or self-loathing is love… Love for others and ourselves, because in a world where Hate is Power, Love is Revolution.

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