Shame and Embarrassment Revisited

The authors report three studies guided by Sabini and Silver’s view of the shame-embarrassment distinction. In each study, participants reported the emotions they would feel in scenarios. In Studies 1 and 2, they found that people reported experiencing shame if a real flaw was exposed but reported embarrassment if an audience member would (reasonably) think such a flaw was exposed. In Study 3, the authors found that the unreasonable perceptions of a flaw by an audience led to reported anger. The data are consistent with the view that people refer to themselves as experiencing shame when they believe that a real flaw of their self has been revealed, they refer to themselves as experiencing embarrassment when they believe that others have reason to think a flaw has been revealed, and they refer to themselves as angry when they believe others unreasonably see them as flawed. The data are inconsistent with the view that embarrassment is tied to violations of conventions, whereas shame is tied to moral failings.