The Relation of Guilt, Shame, Behavioral Self-Blame, and Characterological Self-Blame to Depression in Adolescents over Time

Abstract

This study investigates the similarity between Tangney’s (1996) conceptualization of guilt and shame and Janoff-Bulman’s (1979) conceptualization of behavioral and characterological self-blame (BSB & CSB) in the context of depression in adolescents. Our goals were to examine (1) the convergent and discriminant validity of shame/CSB measures and guilt/BSB measures (2) the relation of depressive symptoms to guilt/BSB and shame/CSB, (3) the correlation between attributional style and guilt/BSB and shame/CSB, (4) the longitudinal relation of depressive symptoms and measures of guilt, shame, BSB, and CSB. Participants were 221 sixth through twelfth graders who completed a two guilt/shame measures, two BSB/CSB measures, two depression measures, and one attributional style measure at two time points. Our results suggest that shame and CSB are the same construct in the context of depression. Guilt and BSB differ from measure to measure. More work is needed to clarify the longitudinal relations.