The Development of Relations between Perceived Controllability and the Emotions of Pity, Anger, and Guilt

Abstract

GRAHAM, SANDRA; DOUBLEDAY, CATHERINE; and GUARINO, PATRICIA A. The Development of Relations between Perceived Controllability and the Emotions of Pity, Anger, and Guilt. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1984, 55, 561-565. The development of causal thought-emotion linkages from an attributional perspective was investigated. Specifically, in this research the relations between perceived controllability of negative events and the emotions of pity, anger, and guilt were examined. Children between the ages of 6 and 11 were asked to recall personal experiences of pity, anger, and guilt and to rate the cause of each emotion on degree of controllability. There were systematicrelations between pity-uncontrollability and anger-controllability among all age groups. In addition, there was a developmental increase in the linkage of guilt to controllable causes of negative events. The results were interpreted as evidence that guilt in young children may be a qualitatively different emotion because of its closer link to outcome than to perceived controllability.