Forgiving Significant Interpersonal Offenses: The Role of Victim/Offender Racial Similarity

doi:10.4236/psych.2011.29141

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Psychology

2011. Vol.2, No.9, 936-940

Forgiving Significant Interpersonal Offenses: The Role of

Victim/Offender Racial Similarity*

Courtney Cornick1, Jessica M. Schultz2, Benjamin Tallman3,

Elizabeth M. Altmaier1,4

1Department of Psychological and Quantitative Foundations, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA;

2Department of Psychology, Augustana College, Rock Island, USA;

3Edward Hines Jr. VA Hospital, Chicago, USA;

4Department of Community and Behavioral Health, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA.

Email: [email protected]

Received August 17th, 2011; revised September 20th, 2011; accepted October 22nd, 2011.

The influence of victim/offender racial similarity on victim forgiveness was investigated in a study of interper-

sonal transgressions. It was hypothesized that racial similarity between victim and offender would influence for-

giveness only for transgressions that were less distressing for the victim. Participants were 104 adults (45 Black

and 59 White) who provided a narrative description of a significant interpersonal transgression they had experi-

enced and completed measures of transgression-related distress and forgiveness. Forgiveness was measured as

positive (benevolence) and negative (revenge, avoidance) motivations toward the offender. For negative motive-

tions, revenge and avoidance, there was no effect of racial similarity: more severe distress was associated with

less forgiveness for all victim/offender pairings. However, the results revealed a significant interaction of vic-

tim/offender racial similarity and distress for positive motivations: Black victims reported increased benevolence

towards Black offenders after more distressing transgressions. Victims in other racial combinations reported re-

duced benevolence for more distressing transgressions. In group favoring of Black offenders by Black victims

may be an unexplored aspect of forgiveness. Little research has addressed the potential influence of context on

interpersonal forgiveness, and this study suggests that these influences may play an important role.

Keywords: Forgiveness, Race, Cultural Psychology, Counseling

Introduction

McCullough et al. (1998) defined forgiveness in motivational

terms: the victim releases negative motivations (e.g., revenge)

towards the offender and assumes positive motivations (e.g.,

goodwill) in the aftermath of an interpersonal transgression.

Similarly, Enright and Fitzgibbons (2000) suggest that forgive-

ness involves the victim overcoming negative affect and judg-

ment towards the offender and instead viewing him or her with

empathy or compassion.

However, it is important to consider forgiveness in a larger

context than that encompassing solely two people, particularly

when a larger perspective suggests societal or contextual influ-

ences on a victim’s forgiveness response. For example, Digeser

(2001) argued that oppressed groups experience a historical

burden of transgressions. Thus, forgiveness may be more diffi-

cult for oppressed persons than for persons with a history of

privilege. This difficulty may be especially present in person-

to-person forgiveness when the offender has a history of privi-

lege and the victim has a history of oppression. Race is an area

of clear differences between groups in terms of privilege and

oppression.

Unfortunately, little is known about the role of race in for-

giveness. Erguner-Tekinalp (2007) studied Black college stu-

dents’ perceptions of historical racism and personally experi-

enced racially offensive acts. When Black students perceived

societal remorse and motivations for reparation, they reported

more forgiveness of historical racial transgressions. However,

these societal influences did not predict forgiveness for person-

ally experienced acts. When the context of racial similarity of

victim to offender is taken into account, forgiveness may be

altered. Miller (2001) summarized research that suggests a

victim will find an offender’s action more disrespectful if the

offender belongs to the same social group as the victim.

Distantly related research that explores whether culturally

different groups are able to forgive one another is relevant to

the current study. One of the primary examples of intergroup

forgiveness was the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of

South Africa. This commission was created to assist with repa-

ration to, and the rehabilitation and restoration of human and

civil dignity of, victims of violations of human rights following

the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act in

1995. Research following the actions of the Commission dem-

onstrated that even in the context of profoundly severe

transgressions, such as murder and torture, victims of one race

were able to forgive offenders of another (Kaminer, Stein,

Mbanga, & Zungu-Dirwayi, 2001; Stein et al., 2008).

Forgiveness is predicted by many factors. For example, hav-

ing an offender apologize for the transgression is positively

related to the victim forgiving him or her (Girard, Mullet, &

Calahan, 2002). Transgression severity is also related to for-

giveness, with more severe transgressions predicting less for-

giveness. However, researchers have not analyzed the role of

racial similarity versus dissimilarity. The above discussion

suggests that people of varying races are able to forgive each

other, although the influence of past historical wrongs may

continue. If one considers research on racial micro aggressions

(see Sue et al., 2007) in combination with privilege and oppres-

sion, it would be reasonable to expect that a transgression

*This research was supported in part by a Summer Research Opportunity

Fellowship awarded to the first author by the Committee on Institutional

Cooperation.

C. CORNICK ET AL. 937

committed by a White offender would have a more negative

effect on a Black victim than if committed by a Black offender.

The current study examined forgiveness as a function of the

racial similarity of the victim and the offender. There were two

objectives for the study. First, is forgiveness affected by

whether the race of the victim is the same or different from that

of the offender? Second, does the impact of the transgression

moderate any relationship between racial difference and for-

giveness? Based on previous research, the hypothesis was that

more severe distress would be associated with less forgiveness.

Method

Participants

Participants were adults from four cities who volunteered

based on advertisements posted in community locations. Data

for the current study were taken from a larger study of the rela-

tionship of forgiveness to posttraumatic growth (Schultz,

Tallman, & Altmaier, 2010) and consisted of those Black and

White victims who identified their offender as Black or White.

The sample consisted of 104 persons. There were 57 females

and 47 males; their average age was 41.67 years, SD = 13.58.

Demographic characteristics of the sample are presented in

Table 1.

Most participants identified a religious affiliation, and the

majority of those were a Christian denomination. Educational

Table 1.

Demographic characteristics.

Characteristic n %

Gender

Male 47 45.2

Female 57 54.8

Race/ethnicity

White 59 56.7

Black 45 43.3

Religious affiliation

Protestant 34 33.0

Catholic 13 12.6

Christian 14 13.6

Spiritual 11 10.7

None 25 24.3

Other 6 5.7

Educational level

Below high school 8 7.7

Some high school 47 45.2

Some college 28 26.9

College degree 12 11.5

Graduate/professional degree 9 8.7

Marital status

Single/never married 52 50.5

Married/cohabitating 16 15.6

Separated/divorced 28 27.2

Widowed 6 5.8

Other 1 1.0

Note: Not all participants answered all questions.

background was diverse: equal numbers reported a graduate/

professional degree as reporting education below high school;

one-third of the sample had enrolled in college. Approximately

half the sample reported being single or never having married.

Procedure

Institutional Review Board approval for the following pro-

cedure was obtained. Flyers inviting participation in a research

study about being “significantly wronged” by another person

were posted in businesses and community centers in four met-

ropolitan areas in the state in which the study was conducted.

The invitation directed potential participants to call a telephone

number for more information. When the telephone was not

personally answered, a voice message directed participants to

leave contact information or to return the call at certain hours.

During the telephone call, participants were informed about the

study and screened for three criteria: age between 18 and 75,

the transgression was not ongoing, and the transgression had

occurred no more than five years before. Participants were then

signed up for data collection at particular times at community

sites.

Upon arrival at the site, participants were provided with in-

formed consent and then completed study measures. Research-

ers (Black and White) were available at each site to answer

questions and monitor participants’ apparent state of distress.

Afterwards, participants were given $20 for their participation

and were provided with a list of local mental health resources

(including low cost and no cost services).

Measures

Demographic Variables

Participants provided information on demographic variables:

age, gender, race, employment status, marital status, educa-

tional status. Participants also provided as much parallel infor-

mation as possible concerning the offender. The participant

wrote a narrative description of the transgression, coded by

raters for type of transgression (see Schultz et al., 2010 for

additional details on coding process) The types of transgress-

sions experienced were sexual assault, physical assault, infidel-

ity, theft or damage of property, slander, betrayal, and lies.

Distress

The Impact of Event Scale—Revised (IES-R; Weiss & Mar-

mar, 1997) assesses subjective distress related to a specific life

event and was used as a measure of distress caused to the par-

ticipant by the transgression. The IES-R consists of 22 items.

Directions, which usually ask participants to rates distress ex-

perienced during the previous 7 days, were modified to assess

the highest distress caused by the transgression. Item responses

range from 0 (not at all) to 4 (extremely); higher scores reflect

increased levels of distress, and the total score can range from 0

to 88. Examples of items include “Pictures about it popped into

my mind” and “I felt irritable and angry”. The IES-R was vali-

dated with two groups of persons: emergency personnel ex-

posed to a freeway collapse and responders to an earthquake.

Coefficient alpha for the total score was previously reported

at .96.

Forgiveness

Interpersonal forgiveness was measured by the Transgres-

sion-related Interpersonal Motivations Inventory—18 (TRIM-18;

McCullough et al., 1998; McCullough, Root, & Cohen, 2006).

The TRIM-18 has three scales: Avoidance (seven items; e.g. “I

withdraw from him/her”), Revenge (five items; e.g. “I’ll make

C. CORNICK ET AL.

938

him/her pay”), and Benevolence (six items; e.g. “Even though

his/her actions hurt me, I have goodwill for him/her”). Partici-

pants used a five-point response scale (1 = strongly disagree to

5 = strongly agree). The three subscales of the TRIM-18 have

demonstrated internal consistency (α > .85) and test-retest sta-

bility (r ≈ .50). McCullough et al. (1998) provided validity

information on the measure’s significant correlation with qual-

ity and closeness of interpersonal relationships.

Results

Data were analyzed using the SPSS program. Table 2 pre-

sents means, standard deviations, and possible score range for

study variables as well as coefficient alpha (scale reliability)

and scale inter-correlations. The first research question ad-

dressed differences in forgiveness as a function of racial simi-

larity between victim and offender. Four dyads were con-

structed based on offender race and participants’ race: White

offender/White victim (n = 53); Black offender/White victim (n

= 6); White offender/Black victim (n = 8); and Black of-

fender/Black victim (n = 37). Based on the dyads, three dummy

variables were created for the regression models. White of-

fender/White victim served as the baseline group (coded as 0)

to which the other three groups were compared (coded as 1).

Before regressions were conducted, assumptions were exam-

ined including normality (e.g., skewness and kurtosis) and out-

liers. Frequency distributions and scatter plots revealed that

continuous variables did not significantly deviate from normal-

ity; thus, the original data were retained. The racial difference

variables were entered into the first block, distress (measured

by the IES-R total) in the second block to control for variability

in forgiveness related to the transgression itself, and three in-

teraction terms between racial difference and distress in the

third block.

Three separate hierarchical regressions were conducted with

TRIM-18 subscales—Avoidance, Revenge, and Benevolence—

as dependent variables. In regression models with avoidance

and revenge as dependent variables, interaction terms were not

significant; distress did not moderate the relationships between

racial similarity and motivations for avoidance and revenge.

The simpler model of racial similarity and distress predicting

forgiveness scales was then considered. In this model, racial

similarity was held constant, and the effect of distress on for-

giveness was examined. Distress was positively related to re-

venge (B = .21, p < .05) and avoidance (B = .22, p < .05) after

controlling for racial similarity.

In the regression model for benevolence as a dependent

variable, a significant interaction emerged between benevo-

lence and the third dummy variable that was coded as Black

offender/Black victim (B = .963, p < .001). The relationship

between racial similarity and benevolence thus depends upon

the psychological impact of the event. The slopes of the four

dyads were graphed to determine the nature of the significant

interaction. See Figure 1. Regression slopes for three dyads—

White offender/White victim, Black offender/White victim,

White offender/Black victim—appeared similar; therefore, non-

significant dummy variables were reexamined in the regres-

sion analysis. No significant findings emerged for the dummy

variables. To increase statistical power two dyads were com-

bined to create a new dummy variable. The Black offender/

Black victim dyad was coded as 1; the other three groups as 0.

As in the previous regression model, the new dummy variable

was entered in the first block, distress in the second, and an

interaction term in the third block. The interaction between

distress and racial similarity/dissimilarity was significant (B =

1.02, p =.000). See Table 3 for regression coefficients.

When a moderated effect is present, it is important to de-

scribe the nature of the interaction (Hayes & Matthes, 2009). A

common approach to examining moderated effects is the

pick-a-point approach. This approach relies on arbitrarily pick-

ing points on the moderator variable at the mean and one stan-

dard deviation above and below the mean (Bauer & Curran,

2005). Confidence intervals are constructed to determine if the

independent variable is statistically significant at the chosen

points on the moderated variable. The Johnson-Neyman (J-N;

Johnson & Neyman, 1936) technique is a more precise method

of examining moderated effects, within linear models, and re-

moves the arbitrariness associated with the pick-a-point ap-

proach. The J-N technique creates confidence bands around

simple slopes of regression lines and provides a visual repre-

sentation, or a region of significance, of the effect of the inde-

pendent variable across values of the moderator variable. Con-

fidence bands are used to derive a point or points along a con-

tinuum at which the moderated variable is statistically signify-

cant.

The SPSS macro developed by Hayes and Matthes (2009)

was used to examine the moderated effects using the J-N tech-

nique. Ninety-five percent J-N confidence bands were con-

structed for the impact of event. The confidence band for the

lower limit was 23.52 and the upper limit was 47.63. Scores

that fall outside the range 23.52 ≤ x ≤ 47.63 are significant. We

also examined the simple slopes of racial difference as a di-

chotomous moderator variable. The simple slope for Black

perpetrator/Black victim dyad was −.159 (LLCI= −.2483, ULCI

= −.0699, p = .000). The simple slope for the combined racial

dyad group was .1288 (LLCI = .0047; ULCI = .2527, p = .04).

As a general statement, results revealed that Black victims

were more forgiving of Black offenders (reported more be-

nevolence) when the transgression was more distressing than

less distressing; for all other racial combinations, the reverse

was true, that victims were less forgiving of offenders when the

Table 2.

Descriptive statistics and corre l a tions of study variables.

Correlations

Variable

1 2 3 4

M SD α Range

1. Distress - .23* .21* –.14 44.8 17.5 .92 0 - 88

2. Avoidance .23* - .43*** –.51** 22.9 7.2 .79 7 - 35

3. Revenge .21* .43*** - –.45** 12.0 5.3 .82 5 - 25

4. Benevolence –.14 –.51** –.45** - 16.8 7.0 .84 6 - 30

Note: Correlations are zero order; *p < .05. **p < .001.

C. CORNICK ET AL. 939

Table 3.

Regression coefficients for forgiveness (Benevolence).

Predictor variable B SEB β

Model 1

Black offender/White victim (BW).128 7.84 3.79

White offender/Black victim (WB)–.031 10.05 –.814

Black offender/Black victim (BB) –.736* 3.92 –10.63

Distress (D) –.362* .05 –.143

BW × D –.194 .149 –.108

WB × D –.012 .209 –.007

BB × D .963** .081 .272

Model 2

Constant 2.127 23.112

Black offender/Black victim (BB) –.756* 3.76 –11.055

Distress (D) –.401** .045 –.159

BB × D 1.020** .077 .288

Note: For Model 1, R2 = .16 (p < .01); for model 2, R2 = .16 (p < .001); For Model

1, BW, WB, and BB were coded as 1; White offender/White victim (coded as 0)

was the baseline group to which the three other groups were compared. For Model

2, BB was coded as 1 and the other groups were coded as 0; *p < .01. **p < .001.

Figure 1.

Graph of regression slopes for racial similarity/dissimilarity dyads.

WW = White offender/White victim. BB = Black offender/Black victim.

WB = White offender/Black victim. BW = Black offender/White victim.

transgression was severe. For the negative forgiveness variables

of revenge and avoidance, there were no effects of racial simi-

larity: all victims reported more revenge and avoidance when

the transgressions were more severe.

Discussion

This research addressed whether being of the same or differ-

ent race than the offender affected victim forgiveness, and

whether any influence of racial similarity on forgiveness was

moderated by the distress caused by the transgression. It is

important to note that participants had experienced transgress-

sions that resulted in significant distress: all categories of trans-

gression were rated as highly distressing with the exception of

theft of personal property, which was rated as moderately dis-

tressing. The research hypothesis was that less distressing of-

fenses would be forgiven more by a victim when the offender

was racially similar.

The results confirmed the hypothesis for the forgiveness re-

sponses of revenge and avoidance. Both Black and White vic-

tims reported more revenge and more avoidance of their of-

fender for more distressing offenses. However, the reverse was

demonstrated for the forgiveness response of benevolence: As

transgression-related distress increased, benevolence also in-

creased for Black victims of Black offenders. Increased trans-

gression-related distress was related to lower benevolence for

all other racial pairings: Black victims and White offenders,

White victims and White offenders, and White victims and

Black offenders.

Research has been published that is relevant to these findings.

Mania (2009) studied Black and White college students’ re-

sponses to media-publicized transgressions committed by a

Black professional athlete and a White professional sport coach

and in-group favoring of forgiveness responses for the Black

athlete by the Black students were noted. However, transgress-

sions used in that study were not personally relevant, and for-

giveness was measured by only two items. The current data,

from adults who had experienced interpersonal transgressions,

also support in-group favoring by Black victims.

Why did Black victims report more benevolent motivations

for Black offenders during highly distressing events than for

transgressions that are less distressing? The conflict perspective

in the field of criminology (Johnson, 2006; Quinney, 1970)

suggests that Black response to injustice is tempered by recog-

nition that both the criminal justice system and society are as-

sociated with out-group prejudice which favors White persons.

More recently, Johnson (2008) found that racial differences in

support for punitive laws and policies, such as three-strike laws,

were partially accounted for by perceived racial bias: Blacks

perceived more bias than Whites, and this perceived bias helped

explain Blacks’ lower support for highly punitive laws.

From another perspective, Witvliet, Knoll, Hinman, and

DeYoung (2010) recently demonstrated that empathy for of-

fenders was reported more within compassion-focused reap-

praisal strategies, which were associated with increased positive

emotions and changed EMG and cardiac activity. In the current

findings, the negative motivations of forgiveness—revenge and

avoidance—were directly related to distress while the positive

motivations—benevolence—revealed a moderating effect of

racial similarity. It appears that empathy for the offender within

this study might have been more triggered when both victim

and offender was Black.

The lack of difference between forgiving someone racially

similar versus racially dissimilar is encouraging from a social

justice perspective. In the literature on the Truth and Recon-

ciliation Commission in South Africa, forgiveness was also

demonstrated across racial and cultural groups (Kaminer et al.,

2001; Stein et al., 2008). For many, forgiveness is a cultural

practice learned through cultural teachings, family, and/or reli-

gious doctrine. Recent literature establishes culturally-specific

conceptualizations of forgiveness, especially among ethni-

cally-based cultures (e.g., Suwartono, Praswasti, & Mullet,

2007).

This research has several limitations. First, the transgressions

were quite severe, and different conclusions might have been

revealed if more “every day” transgressions had been reported.

Examples of these every day transgressions are being cut off in

traffic by another driver, or being interrupted in conversation.

Second, all measures were self-report, and the relationship of

C. CORNICK ET AL.

940

this self-report to behavior is not certain.

Forgiveness is more than an interesting aspect of life; signi-

ficant mental and physical health benefits are related to for-

giveness (Harris & Thoresen, 2005; Wade, Worthington, &

Meyer, 2005). Psychological variables associated with race,

such as collectivist orientation or religious salience, are impor-

tant areas to explore with regard to forgiveness. Other variables

for future research in this area include one’s exposure to dif-

ferent racial groups and forgiveness of racially motivated

transgressions such as discrimination. Last, the potential influ-

ence of race and other societal and contextual variables in study

of forgiveness treatments is also an important area for investi-

gation.

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