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Journal Contribution - Journal Article

Subtitle:when shame causes proselfs to cooperate
Shame is considered a social emotion with action tendencies that elicit socially beneficial behavior. Yet, unlike other social emotions, prior experimental studies do not indicate that incidental shame boosts prosocial behavior. Based on the affect as information theory, we hypothesize that incidental feelings of shame can increase cooperation, but only for self-interested individuals, and only in a context where shame is relevant with regards to its action tendency. To test this hypothesis, cooperation levels are compared between a simultaneous prisoner's dilemma (where defect may result from multiple motives) and a sequential prisoner's dilemma (where second player defect is the result of intentional greediness). As hypothesized, shame positively affected proselfs in a sequential prisoner's dilemma. Hence ashamed proselfs become inclined to cooperate when they believe they have no way to hide their greediness, and not necessarily because they want to make up for earlier wrong-doing.
Journal: The journal of social psychology
ISSN: 0022-4545
Volume: 154
Pages: 1 - 15
Publication year:2013
Keywords:A1 Journal article
BOF-keylabel:yes
BOF-publication weight:0.5
CSS-citation score:1
Authors:International
Authors from:Higher Education
Accessibility:Closed