Conscience and its interrelated constituent aspects: A network and regression analysis in offenders and non-offenders

ABSTRACT

Conscience can be defined as a dynamic psychological function that regulates our behavior and identity through self-reflection, in an interplay of the constituent functions empathy, self-conscious emotions, and moral reasoning. Functions that are self-contained influences, but which together form the conscience. Compared to non-offenders, offenders have been reported to exhibit lower levels of these aspects . This study aims to provide a more dynamic understanding of how these aspects of conscience interact and constitute its functioning. Contrary to our expectation, network analysis (N = 281) revealed no significant differences in the structure or density of conscience networks between offenders (n = 123) and non-offenders (n = 158). Results of regression analyses suggest that conscience depends strongly on the development of self, on decentralization from self-centeredness to a broadened perspective, and more on capacities for affective than cognitive empathy. Cognitive distortions appeared not to be predictive of lower levels of guilt or shame. Failure of one of the constituent aspects appears to negatively affect the functioning of conscience as a whole. Diagnosing conscience functioning must therefore be aimed at all of those aspects in order to enable targeted interventions.

KEYWORDS:

• Conscience
• empathy
• emotions
• moral reasoning
• offending

Acknowledgments

We thank . for their statistical advice, and … for her participation in the statistical analyses.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ Within the early attachment relations, the baby or toddler internalizes self-states and relational states, which together form the implicit self or the “self-as-agent,” as non-verbal internal working models stored in implicit memory (Benjamin, 2018; Schore, 2015). With growing symbolizing and verbalizing capacities, the self-as-subject develops, the awareness of being someone and being seen by others. Now, self-conscious emotions such as shame, pride and guilt are experienced. The child comes to experience him/herself as a person that has agency. The self-as-subject has also been called the narrative self, an integrated pattern of multiple characteristics self-aspects (Dings & Newen, 2021). Around the age of 7, the self-as-object develops. Now, the child can reflect upon him/herself from the first-person stance (Stern, 1985). When in this paper we refer to the self, most of the time we implicitly refer to the self-as-subject, that is being evaluated by the self-as-object.