Guilt Signals a Crisis of Rejection: Two Types of Individual Differences Related to Social Rejection Have Dissimilar Effects on Guilt and Compensatory Behavior

Abstract

We investigated whether feelings of guilt, which signal crises in interpersonal relationships (Baumeister, Stillwell, & Heatherton, 1994), are differently evoked by two types of individual differences in social rejection: rejection detection capability (Kawamoto, Nittono, & Ura, 2015) and rejection sensitivity (Downey & Feldman, 1996). Using the hypothetical scenario method, we found that in situations with a potential risk of being rejected as a consequence of causing another person harm (i.e., harm-present condition), participants with higher rejection detection capability felt more guilt and engaged in more compensatory behavior towards the victims. In addition, guilt mediated the relationship between rejection detection capability and compensatory behavior. Conversely, in situations with no potential risk of being rejected (i.e., harm-absent condition), participants with higher rejection sensitivity felt more guilt but did not engage in much compensatory behavior. These results suggest that individual differences in social rejection foster different responses to specific threats.