Forgiveness takes place on an attitudinal continuum from hostility to friendliness: Toward a closer union of forgiveness theory and measurement.

Abstract

Researchers commonly conceptualize forgiveness as a rich complex of psychological changes involving attitudes, emotions, and behaviors. Psychometric work with the measures developed to capture this conceptual richness, however, often points to a simpler picture of the psychological dimensions in which forgiveness takes place. In an effort to better unite forgiveness theory and measurement, we evaluate several psychometric models for common measures of forgiveness. In doing so, we study people from the United States and Japan to understand forgiveness in both non-close and close relationships. In addition, we assess the predictive utility of these models for several behavioral outcomes that traditionally have been linked to forgiveness motives. Finally, we employ the methods of item response theory, which place person abilities and item responses on the same metric and thus help us draw psychological inferences from the ordering of item difficulties. Our results highlight models based on correlated factors models and bifactor (S-1) models. The bifactor (S-1) model evinced particular utility: Its general factor consistently predicts variation in relevant criterion measures, including four different experimental economic games (when played with a transgressor), and also suffuses a second self-report measure of forgiveness. Moreover, the general factor of the bifactor (S-1) model identifies a single psychological dimension that runs from hostility to friendliness while also pointing to other sources of variance that may be conceived of as method factors. Taken together, these results suggest that forgiveness can be usefully conceptualized as prosocial change along a single attitudinal continuum that ranges from hostility to friendliness.

Revenge and forgiveness after victimization: psychometric evaluation of a Dutch version of the TRIM intended for victims and offenders

“…In this study, we explored the suitability of a Dutch version of the Transgression Related Interpersonal Motivations scale (TRIM;McCullough et al, 1998McCullough et al, , 2006 as a self-report instrument for revenge, avoidance, and benevolence towards the perpetrator in people who are victimized by social transgression, including (criminal) aggression and violence. We translated the TRIM-18 (McCullough et al, 2006;Forster et al, 2019) according to conventional guidelines laid down in the literature on cross-cultural psychology (DeFiguieredo & Lemkau, 1980) and slightly adapted the instruction. We collected data on this version of the TRIM in adolescents from the general community and detainees who were convicted for violent offences.…”

“…Nunnally, 1978), and a sensical pattern of correlations with related constructs, such as dispositional hostility and vengeance, accomplished forgiveness and vengeance, and social desirability response bias (i.e., the tendency to give overly positive self-descriptions). While any significant association of the TRIM with social desirability might be considered to contribute to measurement bias, the TRIM's relationship with dispositional vengeance and hostility, as well as accomplished forgiveness, would reflect meaningful relationships within the nomological forgiveness network (e.g., Forster et al, 2019;McCullough et al, 2006). With regard to this construct validational pattern, we expect that unforgiving motivations (i.e.…”

“…This approach will indicate to what extent we can reliably use the subscales as indices of revenge, avoidance, and benevolence in The Netherlands in forensic and adolescent populations (Briggs & Cheek, 1986), which is our main research interest. We chose an exploratory rather than a confirmatory approach in view of the higher order dimensional structure of the TRIM, which suggested multiple solutions (see McCullough et al, 2006;Forster et al, 2019), with the probability that secondary loadings would limit or complicate the data fit (Church & Burke, 1994). Moreover, we felt that a replication of the three factor solution in new data in another culture and without any force or constraint would provide the strongest support for the scale (e.g., Briggs & Cheek, 1986;Church & Burke, 1994).…”

“…The TRIM subscales showed excellent psychometric qualities in a variety of (mainly student) samples, with internal consistency coefficients well above the recommended Cronbach's alpha>.70 criterion (Nunnally, 1978), and it has an extensive nomological network (e.g., McCullough, Kurzban, & Tabak, 2013;Forster et al, 2019). Having been investigated in primarily social psychological experiments, the TRIM showed a theoretically meaningful pattern of associations with a variety of variables such as relationship satisfaction, relationship closeness, anger, rumination, apologies and other reconciliatory behaviour (McCullough et al, 1998(McCullough et al, , 2014.…”

“…Originally (McCullough et al, 2006), the questionnaire was designed to measure interpersonal motivation in response to a social transgression in close relationships (McCullough et al, 1998(McCullough et al, , 2006. Recently, a TRIM version for Non-Close Others, the TRIM-NCO, was also introduced (Forster et al, 2019). Both TRIMversions start with an incident registration: Respondents are requested to recall a social transgression, i.e., an incident in which one has been hurt by another person, that has occurred during the past week(s) or month, and to briefly describe that particular incident.…”