Shame Research: Concept, Structure and Assessment

Abstract

Recent years has seen much progress in empirical studies of shame in the circle of psychology both at home and abroad, mostly due to thorough understanding of its concept and the development of its assessment. Unfortunately, there are few systematic summaries for existing research studies in this area so far. This paper makes a review of the conceptual structure and measurement of shame, summarizes the theoretical bias, research orientation and assessment paradigm of the psychological society in these three areas, points out the controversies in the existing researches. The paper finally argues that future researches would undergo two changes: from structure and type to relation and situation in research perspective, and from western empirical tradition to domestic one in research paradigm.