The psychology of forgiveness

[Willum]

Of course on of the benefits of asking for forgiveness of god is to relieve debts we have little capability or right to expect forgiveness for, and appealing to a greater judge for that redemption.

But what is the actual effect?

So we do something terrible, like steal, or adulter, or take the lord's name in vain, we feel terrible about it, until we just about burst.
Then we do burst and ask god for forgiveness, and since he forgives us our sins, we feel good about ourselves again.

But what does this mean psychologically? The first case is doing something bad with a result of ultimately feeling good. This is called negative reinforcement.
Then we ask forgiveness, we do something good to feel good. This is called positive reinforcement.

Ultimately this cycle promotes bad behavior, as we are rewarded emotionally for doing something bad, then for doing something good. We are twice rewarded for our sins. How can this make us, or the people of the world better?

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 1 by Willum]

I find this an interesting subject, but I find your concepts might need to be further refined just a tad.

Of course on of the benefits of asking for forgiveness of god is to relieve debts we have little capability or right to expect forgiveness for, and appealing to a greater judge for that redemption.

This is not really a benefit related to god/gods anyone can really ultimately do this. Largely what is happening when one prays to a god/gods for forgiveness of some transgression is to reduce cognitive dissonance.

Let me explain.(hypothetical)

I have a moral system lets say I can't steal.

I have a son who is hungry and I have no food to give him nor money to purchase food to give him. Rather than let the child starve I break my moral system and steal an apple to feed the child.

Now psychologically I have a problem

My moral belief in not stealing is conflicting with the act of stealing. In order to reduce this problem the individual asks for forgiveness resolving the conflict between the two concepts. Whether the individual appeals to a god or himself the active of forgiving oneself for an action or deed that one deems morally bad is important to reduce the cognitive dissonance that develops as a result.

Now things are not always this simple, but that is what is happening during this process of "asking god for forgiveness" in a nutshell. Which of course can be extrapolated to more complex issues.

So we do something terrible, like steal, or adulter, or take the lord's name in vain, we feel terrible about it, until we just about burst.
Then we do burst and ask god for forgiveness, and since he forgives us our sins, we feel good about ourselves again.

But what does this mean psychologically? The first case is doing something bad with a result of ultimately feeling good. This is called negative reinforcement.
Then we ask forgiveness, we do something good to feel good. This is called positive reinforcement.

Ultimately this cycle promotes bad behavior, as we are rewarded emotionally for doing something bad, then for doing something good. We are twice rewarded for our sins. How can this make us, or the people of the world better?

As I explained earlier this really has nothing to do with positive or negative reinforcement. That is really related to conditioning. The individual is not rewarded for the bad action by forgiving himself. That is just a sign of an individual coping with a stressor. Conditioning works in a very different way.

For example

I steal something. I feel bad about it but there was a motivating stimulus that drove me to do it in the first place. Stealing met that motivating stimulus. In the process I did not get caught and suffered no negative consequences. I got to enjoy the benefits of the theft without the negative consequences.

That would be a form of positive reinforcement.

Recognizing that one did something bad and acknowledging that it was bad is not a form of positive reinforcement. The good feeling if any one receives from such a process is more related to the resolve one has not to repeat the behavior.


This is actually something I am ok with as an Atheist. While I don't believe in a god that can forgive you of an immoral behavior or action. Contemplating what one did wrong acknowledging it and moving on is a healthy way to address a problem.

Now there are some issues of course especially "sin" for starters. Because, you can have conflicting moral issues compounding things. Lets say I don't see anything wrong with eating shellfish yet it is listed as a sin. Everytime I eat the shellfish I have to pray for forgiveness. This can actually create an unhealthy environment where one cannot resolve the cognitive dissonance. Creating stress, depression, and anxiety associated with the act of eating shellfish. That can be a negative re-enforcement.

Like I said though it can get really complicated and I have probably simplified things to much. But you have touched on some interesting issues

[Willum]

Wow, quite an amazing post, it brings up quite a few points.

I semi-disagree about being reinforcement- There may be times and cases where it is not reinforcement, but I think the desire to be good and doing things bad leads to negative re-inf..

The cognitive dissonance is very distressing, and relief from this is a powerful form of reinforcement. Stealing and getting away with it compounds the issue without resolve. Stealing and getting away with it means, to me you are much more likely to try it again, rather than refrain.

I wonder, as an aside, if this is why Christian stories are more profound than non-there are more extremes and the drama of the struggle, advertised grand victories and sympathetic forgiven failures of the penitent.

I don't think I covered everything... but it's a start.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 3 by Willum]

but I think the desire to be good and doing things bad leads to negative re-inf..

I am not sure I follow could you elaborate maybe?

The cognitive dissonance is very distressing, and relief from this is a powerful form of reinforcement. Stealing and getting away with it compounds the issue without resolve. Stealing and getting away with it means, to me you are much more likely to try it again, rather than refrain.

Yes cognitive dissonance is distressing and not just on a level of consciousness but also physiological cortisol levels rise etc. However, the relief from this is a good thing not a bad thing. If an individual commits an immoral action that causes him mental and physical distress through stress hormones blood pressure etc. that is the negative reinforcement to not do that action or behavior again. By recognizing the action was wrong and dealing with it is a positive thing. So simply put

the negative reinforcement involved is the cognitive dissonance. This helps prevent the repeating the behavior. the positive reinforcement of recognizing it was wrong and taking measures to prevent it from happening again relieving the cognitive dissonance is also helping to prevent the behavior from being repeated. This is a good thing. Positive and negative reinforcement can both be used to prevent a behavior. The Positive and negative part doesn't mean that only good and bad behavior gets each respective conditioning.

We start having issues when individuals do not feel compelled to forgive themselves or in some other way alleviate the stress caused by the immoral action. That is actually a sign of deeper psychological issues like psychopathy or narcissism.

[Willum]

[Replying to post 4 by DanieltheDragon]

I can't tell if you're trolling me or serious. Reinforcement, in negatives for positive reward and positives for reward... and so, I am confused.

Your presentations seem contradictory, yet intelligently reasoned.

Are you inflicting "cognitive dissonance," on this thread?

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 5 by Willum]

lol I hear yeah and I am probably not 100% elaborating correctly. The terminology I think gets in the way and in this case it has. I got my terminology mixed up.

what I meant was negative reinforcers and positive reinforcers not reinforcement.

reinforcer - (psychology) a stimulus that strengthens or weakens the behavior that produced it.

so yeah I will amend my previous post. I can see now how that could be incredibly confusing. lesson learned don't try and write something when you have had little sleep

so the CD as a negative reinforcer discourages the bad behavior

the removal of CD is a positive reinforcer but the behavior associated is not the bad behavior it is the recognition of the bad behavior as being bad. this helps prevent the behavior from repeating.

[Willum]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... uilty.html

More extreme emotions, means more behavior modification/reinforcement.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 7 by Willum]

What was the net result? No difference in the quality or amount of moral/immoral behavior. The study you linked is exactly what I was trying to say. They might experience things more on an emotional level but the net result is the same.

[Willum]

[Replying to DanieltheDragon]

Remember, I'm still pretty confused about the points you made. )

It is human nature though, except for pain and life threateners, etc., the more extreme the emotion, the more likely you are to repeat the action. If someone feels (harmless) guilt more than someone else, they are more likely to seek out the stimulation. Especially if by the same track you can acquire the magnificent feeling of being forgiven by the creator of the universe.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 9 by Willum]

Well I am not sure there is a creator of the universe, but lets try taking this a different direction and make some logical assumptions about what you are claiming.


1. Prayer increases the probability of repeated bad behavior
2. Prayer is a positive reinforcer for bad behavior.


religious people pray non religious people don't pray.


If we have two groups of lets say 500 each believers and non believers over a period of time what would we expect of the two groups?


The believers would commit more bad behaviors than the non-believing group.

Why then did the study that you showed suggest there was no difference at all?

If we should expect according to your hypothesis that prayer increases the likelyhood of repeating bad behavior why did this not show up in the results?


Are the results bad?
Should the study be discounted for bad data?
Was the study long enough to account for changes accumulating over time?
Is your hypothesis wrong?
If your hypothesis is wrong are you making bad assumptions and if so what are they?

Lets look at some of these assumptions




1. A bad behavior is made
2. the person feels guilt about the bad behavior
3. prayer is a positive feeling that relieves the guilt


is there anything missing? I think so. let me make a mathematical model to represent this.


N= 0 N represents your basic Neutral state
B=1(g) B represents the bad behavior
g=-1(s) g represents the guilt and (s) represents the severity of that guilt
P=1 P represents prayer
X= N+B+p X=Current state

so we have:

N+B+P=X
0-1+1=0

what you a`are missing it seems is that guilt is a negative reinforcer

so the bad behavior is counteracted by the positive behavior and a net result of 0

there are no positive gains being made by prayer.


I think what you need to show is that prayer creates on average more people that repeat bad behavior. I am unaware of any such study that confirms this.




as for ". Especially if by the same track you can acquire the magnificent feeling of being forgiven by the creator of the universe." is there any evidence to suggest that such a thing exists? I am not sure it can be applicable unless it can be demonstrated in some meaningful way.