Understanding the Psychology of Guilt – The Role of Self-discrepancies in Distinguishing Regret from Guilt – Chapter 2

Regret and guilt are self-conscious emotions. They stem from
negative events for which people feel responsible. Both emotions
reflect discrepancies between how people are (their “actual” self)
and how they would like to be (their “ideal” or “ought” self). We
examined whether regret and guilt were related to different self-discrepancies (i.e., “ideal” and “ought” self-discrepancies). Two
studies (total N = 1998) with Chinese and US participants found
that people feel more regret over ideal self-discrepancies than over
ought self-discrepancies, whereas for guilt this is more complex.
We also found a main effect for culture such that ideal self-discrepancies were associated more with both emotions in the
USA compared to China. Implications for the differences between
regret and guilt are discussed.