Cited by 48Emotions and Moral BehaviorNeural and Behavioral Psychology StudiesDeception detection and forensic psychology

Negative social emotions and cognition: Shame, guilt and working memory impairments

Open access
Cavalera, Cesare, Pepe, Alessandro, Zurloni, Valentino, Diana, Barbara, Realdon, Olivia, Todisco, Patrizia, Castelnuovo, Gianluca, Molinari, Enrico +1 more·2018·Acta Psychologica

Abstract

Negative emotions can have an impact on a variety of cognitive domains, including Working Memory (WM). The present work investigated whether shame and guilt modulate WM performance in a dual-task test both in a non-clinical and a clinical population. In Experiment 1, 76 non-clinical participants performed a dual-task before and after being randomly assigned to shame, guilt or neutral inductions elicited by the writing of autobiographical past experiences. Shame and guilt elicitations were related to impaired WM performances. In Experiment 2, 65 clinical inpatients with eating disorders were assigned to the same procedure. The negative relationship of self-conscious emotions and WM was confirmed. Taken together these results suggest that shame and guilt are related to impairments of WM in both clinical and non-clinical participants.

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Crossref · 10.1016/j.actpsy.2018.05.005

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  • Shame can be more strongly associated with various psychological symptoms than guilt.

    “Even if the different studies showed that shame can be more strongly associated with various psychological symptoms [33–35]”

    From The “common” experience of voice-hearing and its relationship with shame and guilt: a systematic review (2022) · cites this paper as [34]

    The General discussion (page unavailable) reports that shame had a greater impact than guilt in predicting worse working-memory performance in the studied samples. It does not establish that shame is more strongly associated with various psychological symptoms; the comparison is limited to working-memory performance. (LLM, conf=0.83)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • This may be related to an overload of working memory that can be found within guilt and shame activations.

    “This may be related to an overload of the working memory that can be found within guilt and shame activations [34].”
  • There are reasons to expect that shame in response to a stressful event can be involved in the elicitation of AVH.

    “Given that induction of shame led to increased levels of intrusive thoughts and working memory impairments [34], there are reasons to expect that shame in response to a stressful event can be involved in the elicitation of AVH [53].”

    From The “common” experience of voice-hearing and its relationship with shame and guilt: a systematic review (2022) · cites this paper as [34]

    The General discussion reports that eliciting shame can impair working memory and discusses intrusive thoughts, but it does not address auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH). A search for AVH, hallucinations, and shame following stressful events found no passage connecting shame to the elicitation of AVH. The working-memory clause in the citing sentence carries a separate citation. (LLM, conf=0.76)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

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Research works printed but not linked: 5

  1. Gilbert, P., & Miles, J. (Eds.). (2014). Body shame: Conceptualisation, research and treat- ment. London: Routledge.
  2. Gruenewald, T. L., Kemeny, M. E., Aziz, N., & Fahey, J. L. (2004b). Acute threat to the social self: Shame, social self-esteem, and cortisol activity. Psychiatric Medicine, 66(6), 915-924. http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/01.psy.0000143639.61693.ef. · DOI
  3. Pedhazur, E. J. (1997). Multiple regression in behavioural research (2nd ed.). Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace.
  4. Tangney, J. P., & Dearing, R. L. (2002). Emotions and social behavior. Shame and guilt. New York: Guilford Press.
  5. Tracy, J. L., Robins, R. W., & Tangney, J. P. (Eds.). (2007). The self-conscious emotions: Theory and research. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

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Authors
Cavalera, C., Pepe, A., Zurloni, V., Diana, B., Realdon, O., Todisco, P., Castelnuovo, G., Molinari, E., & Pagnini, F.
Affiliations
  • Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (IT)
  • University of Milano-Bicocca (IT)
Corresponding author
Cavalera, Cesare
Venue
Acta Psychologica
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2018-07
Volume
188
Pages
9-15
ISSN
0001-6918 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2803371928
Cited by
48
References
50
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 1
FWCI
3.38
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Acta Psychologica (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • BOA (University of Milano-Bicocca) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Emotions and Moral Behavior
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Deception detection and forensic psychology
Keywords
shame, guilt, working memory, negative emotions, self-conscious emotions, dual-task performance, emotion induction, autobiographical writing, eating disorders, emotion-cognition interaction
MeSH terms
Adult, Feeding and Eating Disorders, Cognition, Emotions, Female, Guilt, Humans, Inpatients, Male, Memory Disorders, Memory, Short-Term, Shame, Task Performance and Analysis, Writing, Young Adult

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