The other side of transgression: self forgiveness and couple satisfaction

Many scholars agree in considering forgiveness as a crucial topic for the study of family relations. During the last decades, many empirical studies have focused on forgiving in romantic relationships with the aim to clarify the forgiveness determinant process and the role of forgiveness in couple satisfaction. Forgiveness helps partners overcome negative feelings and prevent couple disruption. However, little theoretical and empirical attention has been paid on the other side of transgression: the offender’s perspective and emotions as well as offender’s self-forgiveness. Usually, when a person hurts another, he/she consequently experiences degrees of guilt and other negative feelings about the wrongdoing. Self-forgiveness occurs when the offender is able to overcome negative feelings arising from the harm. Research underlines that dispositional self-forgiveness is related to psychological well-being but there are very few studies which aim to study self forgiveness in a close relationship and in particular about a specific offence. The present study considers transgressor admission of responsibility a key point in the self-forgiveness process. Self forgiveness is also considered as a coping strategy influenced both, by individual and by interpersonal determinants. The aim of the study is to examine whether self forgiveness can be regarded as a pro-relationship process, promoting both the offender’s and the victim’s couple satisfaction like interpersonal forgiveness does. The sample is composed of 153 married or dating couples. Partners had to remember a wrongdoing against the other partner which he/she admits responsibility for and which the victim keeps in mind. Actor–Partner Interdependence Model (APIM) proposed by Kenny et al. (1996) was chosen as data-analytic technique: it permitted to consider both the offender and victim within-partner and cross-partner effects simultaneously.