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Two promising shame and guilt scales: a construct validity comparison.
1Department of Psychology, Tufts University, Medford, MA 02155.
This study evaluated two shame and guilt scales, finding both reliable. The Hoblitzelle Adapted Shame and Guilt Scale (ASGS) showed slightly better shame validity, while the Harder Personal Feelings Questionnaire (PFQ2) better measured guilt.
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Area of Science:
- Psychology
- Personality Psychology
- Clinical Psychology
Background:
- Shame and guilt proneness are crucial personality dimensions.
- Accurate measurement of these emotions is vital for psychological research and clinical applications.
- Existing scales require rigorous validation to ensure their psychometric properties.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare the psychometric properties of two shame and guilt proneness measures: the revised Harder Personal Feelings Questionnaire (PFQ2) and the Hoblitzelle Adapted Shame and Guilt Scale (ASGS).
- To assess internal consistency, test-retest stability, factor structure, and construct validity of both scales.
- To explore the development of potentially improved scales based on factor and item analyses.
Main Methods:
- Administered PFQ2 and ASGS to 63 college students.
- Collected data on theoretically relevant personality scales.
- Analyzed internal consistency, test-retest stability, factor structure, and convergent/discriminant validity.
Main Results:
- Both scales demonstrated acceptable reliability and supported their respective shame and guilt factor structures.
- The ASGS shame subscale showed marginally better validity with external variables compared to PFQ2 shame.
- The PFQ2 guilt subscale exhibited significantly higher validity than the ASGS guilt subscale.
Conclusions:
- Both the PFQ2 and ASGS are reliable measures of shame and guilt proneness.
- Each scale has unique strengths, with ASGS better for shame and PFQ2 for guilt.
- Newly developed scales from item and factor analyses did not yield improved validity over the original measures.

