www.upworthy.com
Experts share why being guilt-prone is actually a top sign that someone is trustworthy
Self-conscious emotions often get a bad rap. When we think of shame or embarrassment, guilt is not usually far behind. We often assume these types of feelings are negative, but the truth is—they can be excellent indicators that a person has a pretty decent moral compass.In a study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, researchers sought to determine indicators of trustworthiness. The 2018 paper "Who is trustworthy? Predicting Trustworthy intentions and behavior" makes a huge distinction about their intentions right off the bat: "Existing trust research has disproportionately focused on what makes people more or less trusting, and has largely ignored the question of what makes people more or less trustworthy."Their findings are pretty clear cut: The number one indicator of trustworthiness? Being prone to guilt. "Guilt-proneness predicts trustworthiness better than a variety of other personality measures, and we identify sense of interpersonal responsibility as the underlying mechanism by both measuring it and manipulating it directly. People who are high in guilt-proneness are more likely to be trustworthy than are individuals who are low in guilt-proneness, but they are not universally more generous."
See on Instagram
Writer Leah Fessler cites the study in her piece, "Who should you trust? Psychologists have a fascinating answer," for Quartz: "Guilt-proneness is not the same as feeling guilty, and this distinction is key to understanding why guilt-proneness is a positive trait, especially as it relates to trustworthiness."It's all about the anticipation of guilt, and one's hope is: this trait might prevent someone from behaving in a negative manner. The line of thinking goes something like this: "If I steal money from Emily, that would really hurt her feelings, so I won't do it."Fessler further explains, "We typically think about guilt as a signal that someone did do something wrong, which is why it’s seen as a character flaw." She references Emma Levine, an assistant psychology professor at University of Chicago. "But feeling guilty about wrongdoing is a good thing," Levine says, "whereas doing something wrong and not feeling guilty would be problematic, as it suggests a lack of remorse and no intention to repair your transgressions." Explanation as to why guilt can be a good thing. www.youtube.com, Anna Akana In the article "The Problem with Guilt" for Psychology Today, authors Tara Ceranic Salinas, Ph.D., and Ed Love, Ph.D., explain simply that "Guilt serves an important purpose in guiding our behavior by causing us to evaluate our moral worth and how we fit in the various communities to which we belong. Along with shame and embarrassment, it is part of the self-conscious emotion family, and these inward-facing emotions motivate ethical behavior. (Note: they don't distinguish between guilt or guilt-prone, but we get the idea.)They acknowledge that "Guilt is tricky. Feeling guilty makes us realize we have messed up–even if we haven’t!" They provide a few tools for processing guilt, such as acknowledgement (owning what they've done), self-reflection (how does it make them feel?), and still having plenty of compassion for yourself after the mistake has been made. None of us are perfect, even those who are trustworthy. A woman looks guilty. Giphy The Reddit post titled "Guilt-prone people are highly skilled at recognising other people’s emotions" has another spin on the matter. The guilt-prone aren't not just more trustworthy. They're more empathetic.A commenter shares, "It's not surprising if you think about the neurobiology of it. Guilt, shame, and empathy come from the same areas in the brain. Psychopaths have less amount of grey matter in the parts of the brain that regulates these traits."Probably safe to assume that "psychopaths" aren't the most trustworthy, so, yes—it totally tracks.
Odysee
New Posts (Home)
ChatBox
Popular Posts 
Game Zone
Top PodCasts
