Forgiveness Perceptions: Does Recalling an Experience of Being Loved (or Hurt) Make a Difference?

C. S. Lewis noted that we think of forgiveness as a lovely idea until we have something to forgive (Lewis, 1952/2002). Forgiveness as a moral virtue is challenging because it involves a deliberate choice of love despite the hurt caused by another and the effortful practice of growing in that love (Enright, 2001). The main question in this paper was inspired by the idea by Lewis (1952/2002) that forgiveness perceptions are likely to change depending on the type of affective experience activated when thinking about forgiveness. We report two studies that examined the effect of recalling past events of hurt versus love on participants’ perception of forgiveness (i.e., beautiful, good, virtuous, difficult, complicated, and demanding) among college students at a large Christian university.

Forgiveness

Following Enright (2001), we define forgiveness as a three-step construct: acknowledging that an objective wrong has been done to the forgiver, abandoning resentment toward the offender, and developing something good from within such as kindness, respect, compassion, and even moral love toward the offender. The empirical literature on forgiveness has been growing rapidly for the past few decades. In particular, Forgiveness Therapy (FT) has been tested with a variety of populations and is accepted as a viable way to help individuals to recover from past wounds and achieve better psychological well-being (Enright & Fitzgibbons, 2015). Findings suggest that forgiveness reduces anger, anxiety, and depression, and increases self-esteem and hope for the future (Enright & Fitzgibbons, 2015; Wade et al., 2014).

Also, studies suggest a link between forgiveness and physical health (Lee & Enright, 2019). A few studies have been done to see the effect of FT on physical health, and initial findings are promising. For instance, Waltman et al. (2008) conducted a forgiveness intervention with patients with coronary artery disease and found that compared to those in the control group, those who learned to forgive over a 10-week period showed improvement in their heart functioning at the 10-week follow-up.

As proposed by Worthington and Scherer (2004), it seems that unforgiveness is a powerful emotion that increases stress but can be overcome when those unjustly hurt by another learn to forgive. Health benefits ensue as the deleterious effects of unforgiveness diminish over time. Popular forgiveness models provide ample empirical support, such as the Enright Process Model of Forgiveness (Enright, 2001) and Worthington’s REACH model (Worthington, 2003). Given that forgiveness is a choice, one of the challenging steps in leading others to forgiveness is to help them see forgiveness as something good so that those unjustly hurt are willing to give it a try.

A few studies that examined how forgivers are seen by others might hinder the decision to forgive. For instance, some believe that victims who decide to forgive appear weak, though empirical evidence suggests otherwise, that forgivers feel a sense of empowerment upon forgiving their transgressor (Raj & Wiltermuth, 2016; Strelan et al., 2017). Another example shows that in the absence of clear moral wrongdoing, forgivers might be seen as morally self-righteous, which can lead to others avoiding them, resulting in the worsening of their relationships (Adams et al., 2015). Thus, the relational benefits of forgiveness can depend on how others perceive the expression of forgiveness. These examples show that perceptions attributed to forgivers might become barriers to forgiving. There are also studies showing the link between one’s decision and understanding of forgiveness. For instance, if forgiveness and justice are seen as mutually exclusive, victims might not see forgiveness as a viable option because they would not want to sacrifice their right to justice (Raj & Wiltermuth, 2016; Strelan et al., 2017).

However, to our knowledge, there is no study that attempted to manipulate one’s perception of forgiveness to increase the likelihood of forgiving, especially by eliciting one’s feelings of love.

Attachment Security Priming and Forgiveness

Current emotions might be altered by the availability of positive or negative representations of past experiences with others. Thus, we adopted our method from the literature on attachment security priming, which is used to expose the cognitive processes related to the internal attachment as well as the cognitive materials of an individual’s attachment-related behaviors (Gillath & Karantzas, 2019). Security priming may make mental representations in an individual’s memory more accessible. For instance, findings from a study by Bryant and Chan (2017) suggest that priming attachment security decreases distress when reactivating a memory, which may lower the number of subsequent intrusive memories of traumatic events.

Also, studies suggest a link between attachment orientations and the practice of forgiveness, especially in romantic relationships. According to Mikulincer and Shaver (2007), people with a secure romantic attachment who hold positive mental images of themselves and their partner would more easily ignore or forgive their partner’s transgressions, whereas those who do not have a secure attachment may be more likely to dwell on events that confirm their negative expectations for their partner. Dwiwardani et al. (2014) have explored the hypothesis that attachment security provides a foundation for practicing forgiveness. Results of this study showed that attachment security explained 12.1% of the variance in dispositional forgiveness, which indicates that secure attachment might foster greater forgiveness. This link between attachment security and the practice of forgiveness has been supported through a longitudinal study, in which attachment-avoidance was negatively associated with forgiveness toward the partner two years later (Dewitte et al., 2021).

We do not think that all forms of forgiveness are equally true. There must be a universal essence of forgiveness across time, people, and cultures/situations despite the different perceptions of forgiveness that exist in individual subjective minds. However, it is true that how one views forgiveness could influence one’s practice of forgiveness and its emotional outcomes (Belicki et al., 2020). Our study attempted to use the attachment security priming method to activate one’s feelings of love (or hurt) to see the effect of the activated emotions on participants’ attitudes toward forgiveness. The assumption in our study, which we tested, was despite the unchanging nature of forgiveness in its essence. One’s attitude toward forgiveness could be altered depending on what sort of memories, positive or negative, were at the forefront for those who are considering forgiveness.

The Current Study

The aim of our study was to see if having participants recall a time(s) when they were loved versus hurt would make a difference in their view of forgiveness. When unjustly hurt by another, we have an important decision to make: to forgive or not. However, as Lewis (1952/2002) has noted, it is precisely when we have been hurt that we have a hard time thinking about forgiveness as something good while, in other times, we generally think of it as good when things are going well. In other words, it is an immense challenge to introduce the idea of forgiveness to those who are dealing with injustices and struggling to make sense of the suffering they experienced. Then, would priming people to dwell on positive relational experiences make a difference in their attitude toward forgiveness? Would they perceive forgiveness as more positive or negative?

The first study examined and compared the effect of feeling “deeply” loved versus “deeply” hurt. The second study examined and compared the effect of feeling loved versus hurt on multiple occasions. Thus, the first study focused on quality while the second study focused on quantity. In Study 1, we predicted that thinking of a time when participants were deeply hurt or deeply loved would make a difference in their view of forgiveness. More specifically, we predicted that recalling an experience of deep love would help participants see forgiveness as more beautiful and less difficult (i.e., more plausible). In Study 2, we predicted that recalling multiple recent occasions of being hurt or loved would make a difference in their perception of forgiveness. More specifically, we predicted, as we did in Study 1, that recalling multiple experiences of being loved as opposed to hurt would help them see forgiveness as more beautiful and less challenging.

Study 1

Participants, Methods, and Procedures

IRB approval was obtained prior to recruitment efforts. Students taking at least one psychology course from a large Christian university participated in this study by clicking on an online survey available on the Department of Psychology website. Participants (N = 218) consisted of 185 females (about 85%), 217 Christians (close to 100%), and 189 Whites (about 87%) with a mean age of 19.84 (SD = 3.61).

The first page of the online survey was the consent form, and only those who consented to participate were able to proceed to the next screen that asked about their demographic information. Then, participants were randomly shown prompts for one of the three conditions: Experimental Condition 1 (n = 72) “deeply loved”; Experimental Condition 2 (n = 72) “deeply hurt”; and Control Condition (n = 74) breathing exercise (one minute). The actual prompt for Experimental Condition 1 was as follows:

Please take a moment to think about a time when you felt unconditionally loved. Who was the person who showed you unconditional love? How did you feel? Try to visualize the moment as much as possible. Please briefly describe the moment when you felt unconditionally loved by another.

For Experimental Condition 2, the prompt was changed so that it was asking participants to recall a time when they were deeply hurt by another. For the control condition, participants were asked to focus on their breathing for a minute and select “yes” to continue when one minute had passed.

Then, participants were asked to indicate to what extent they agree with the following adjectives, on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree): Forgiveness is: (1) beautiful; (2) good; (3) virtuous; (4) difficult; (5) complicated; and (6) demanding. We combined the following three items and used them as a measure of participants’ view of forgiveness as good: beautiful, good, and virtuous. We combined the following three items and used them as a measure of participants’ view of forgiveness as difficult: difficult, complicated, and demanding. Each scale ranged from 3 to 21, and Cronbach’s alphas for the two scales were adequate: α = .93 for the Forgiveness-as-Good Scale. and α = .79 for the Forgiveness-as-Difficult Scale.

Results

Using one-way MANOVA, we tested the effect of the three experimental conditions on participants’ views of forgiveness as good and forgiveness as difficult. There was a significant overall effect of conditions on the two aspects of forgiveness that participants rated, F(2, 214) = 3.45, p = .009; Wilks’ Lambda = .94, partial η² = .03.

Using Bonferroni’s method, we adjusted the alpha rate and examined the overall effects of the three conditions on each of the two outcome measures. We found no significant difference between the three conditions in participants’ view of forgiveness as good, F(2, 215) = 0.10, p = .812. However, we found an overall effect of the experimental conditions on participants’ view of forgiveness as difficult, F(2, 215) = 4.73, p = .02, Partial η² = .04. Upon further analysis, again using Bonferroni’s method to control for the alpha rate, we examined where the actual difference laid across the three conditions and found that there was a significant difference between the “deeply loved” (M =15.57, SD = 4.58) and “deeply hurt” (M = 17.53, SD = 3.64) conditions, Mdiff = -1.96, 95%CI [-3.51, -.40], p = .008. Note that the view of forgiveness as difficult for those in the control condition (M =16.82, SD = 3.29) was not statistically different from the two experimental conditions; a statistically significant difference was found between the two experimental conditions only.

Study 2

Participants, Methods, and Procedures

Participants (N = 88) were recruited from the same university using the same procedures as Study 1. Participants consisted of 74 females (about 84%), 88 Christians (100%), and 81 Whites (92%) with a mean age of 20.48 (SD = 5.40). Study 1 focused on the depth of love or hurt from one occasion, so in Study 2, we investigated the effect of multiple occasions of feeling loved or hurt within the past week. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the two experimental groups who recalled five recent occasions of being loved or hurt within the past seven days or the control group who recalled any five events that affected them in any way within the past seven days. Participants were asked to identify and describe each event they recalled.

Then, the same six adjectives that indicate participants’ perception of forgiveness were given, and participants rated them on a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree) as done in Study 1. The Forgiveness-as-Good Scale comprised of the following three items: beautiful, good, and virtuous, while the Forgiveness-as-Difficult Scale comprised of the following three items: difficult, complicated, and demanding. The internal consistency reliability for these two scales was lower compared to Study 1 (which had a larger sample size) but was still within the acceptable range: α = .71 for the Forgiveness-as-Good Scale and α = .67 for the Forgiveness-as-Difficult Scale.

In addition, we also used the 18-item Heartland Forgiveness Scale (HFS; Thompson et al., 2005) to observe the potential relationships between forgiveness perceptions and participants’ general tendency to forgive (i.e., dispositional forgiveness or typical forgiving responses without focusing on a specific injustice). The HFS is a measure of participants’ self-evaluated dispositional forgiveness of the self, others, and situations across time and situations. Participants rated each of the 18 items on a seven-point Likert-type scale from 1 (False of me) to 7 (True of me). A sample item includes “I continue to punish a person who has done something that I think is wrong.” Cronbach’s alpha in the current sample was adequate with an α of .87.

Results

We planned the same statistical analysis strategies as in Study 1 (MANOVA, ANOVA, and post hoc paired-wise comparisons). The MANOVA did not result in statistically significant findings across the experimental conditions, so we concluded that there was no effect of recalling multiple occasions of being hurt versus loved on participants’ perceptions of forgiveness.

Upon an examination of the relationships between dispositional forgiveness and forgiveness perceptions as good and difficult, we found that participants’ self-evaluation of themselves as typically forgiving across time and situations showed a statistically significant positive correlation with the Forgiveness-as-Good Scale (r = .30, p = .005) and the Forgiveness as Difficult Scale (r = -.25, p = .021). See Table 1 for descriptive statistics and correlation coefficients.

Table 1

Descriptive statistics and correlation coefficients of the study variables in Study 2

Note. *p < .05. **p < .01.

General Discussion

The primary findings in these two experimental studies are as follows: The activated memory of being deeply loved influences individuals’ perceptions of forgiveness as difficult compared to the activated memory of being deeply hurt. In other words, compared to those who are thinking about a time when they were deeply hurt by another, those who are thinking about a time when they were deeply loved by another tend to see forgiveness as a more plausible option.

However, according to the findings of Study 2, thinking about multiple occasions of feeling loved versus hurt does not make a difference, suggesting the supremacy of the quality of being deeply loved as opposed to the quantity of being loved. In other words, the depth of being loved seems to matter more than the quantity of being loved when one is evaluating forgiveness.

In addition, we found statistically significant associations between participants’ self-evaluated tendency and their view of forgiveness, which seems to suggest that forgivers’ self-efficacy beliefs might make a difference in how they perceive forgiveness.

Furthermore, among the participants (near 100% Christians from one large Christian university) in Study 1 including control groups, the perceptions of forgiveness as beautiful, good, and virtuous remained consistent across all conditions (therefore, there was no overall effect of the manipulations on the Forgiveness-as-Good scale). The lack of variability in the participants’ reporting of forgiveness as good seems to suggest that, at least at the cognitive level, “everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea” as C. S. Lewis (1952/2002) predicted. However, participants saw forgiveness as more difficult when they were thinking of a time when they were deeply hurt, again confirming C. S. Lewis’s (1952/2002) insight that forgiveness is seen as lovely “until he has something to forgive.”

Two points need to be made here for clarity: (1) Different from C. S. Lewis’s insight, forgiveness continues to be seen as good even when someone has been wronged. The difference was in how difficult forgiveness appeared to them. In other words, Christians (our sample), though they continue to see that forgiveness is a lovely idea, see it as more challenging when remembering a time when they were deeply hurt. (2) The specific difference in Study 1 was found only between the two experimental conditions as the control group was not statistically different from the two experimental groups. In other words, the manipulation would work if someone were struggling to forgive (thus, thinking of forgiveness as difficult).

Our findings are consistent with the existing literature. In romantic relationships where one partner has been wronged, the wronged person could see forgiveness as less challenging when they recalled a time when their partner made them feel deeply loved (Luchies et al., 2013). As seen earlier, attachment literature suggests that attachment security can provide a foundation for the practice of forgiveness (Dwiwardani et al., 2014), and those wronged are more likely to forgive if they are securely attached to their romantic partner (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007; Dewitte et al., 2021). Also, as we have shown, making certain emotional memories in relationships more vivid (e.g., recalling a time when they were deeply loved by another as manipulated in our study) could possibly decrease distress related to the memories of relational traumas, consistent with the findings from Bryant and Chan (2017).

Practical Applications

First, forgiveness is in general seen as good (especially among Christians), which presents opportunities for therapists to implement Forgiveness Therapy. However, seeing forgiveness as good at the cognitive level does not mean that clients are likely to choose to forgive because forgiveness is simultaneously seen as difficult and challenging. When considering therapeutic goals during the course of treatment for individuals, asking clients who are struggling with unforgiveness to recall a time when they felt deeply or unconditionally loved, but not thinking of multiple occasions of being loved from many people, may help them to see forgiveness as less difficult and challenging. The recollection of deep love can potentially encourage clients to consider forgiveness as a goal in therapeutic treatment.

For Christians, forgiveness is already an important practice as the Bible tells us to love our enemies (Matthew 5:44) and to forgive as we are forgiven by God in Christ (Ephesians 4:32; Colossians 3:13). As seen in our study, Christian clients are likely to see forgiveness as something virtuous. However, when they are struggling to forgive, it may be helpful to prime them to think of Christ’s sacrificial love manifested on the cross when we were still sinners (Romans 5:8). As Christian clients reflect on how much they are loved by God who sent His one and only begotten Son (John 3:16), they might be able to see extending forgiving love to their offenders as a more plausible option.

Second, Study 2 shows that people who tend to think of themselves as a generally forgiving person have a positive attitude toward forgiveness, seeing forgiveness as more beautiful and less challenging. On the other hand, those who think of themselves as not being very good at forgiving others typically have a more negative attitude toward forgiveness, viewing it as less beautiful and more challenging. These findings seem to tap into Bandura’s (1977) emphasis on self-efficacy beliefs. Though our findings specific to this idea are correlational, it seems feasible that those who think of themselves as more forgiving are likely to see forgiveness as more plausible. Therefore, therapists hoping to help their clients to forgive should consider ways to increase their clients’ self-efficacy beliefs about forgiveness. They first need to believe that they can forgive in order to consider forgiveness.

Thus, the suggestion of helping clients become ready to forgive prior to having them tackle challenging issues introduced by Enright (2015) appears to be valid in promoting forgiveness. If they become familiar with forgiveness practices over time (by starting the practice of forgiveness with smaller matters first), they are likely to develop stronger self-efficacy beliefs about their ability to forgive, which might in turn help them face a more serious injustice. Also, in the REACH forgiveness model (Worthington, 2011), participants are asked to describe the hardest forgiveness they ever practiced before they consider forgiveness. By remembering the time when they courageously practiced forgiveness, they might see themselves as more capable of forgiving, which in turn would help them face current injustices that they hope to overcome.

Limitations and Future Directions

We have conducted a novel experimental study focusing on attachment priming and forgiveness perceptions. Though some insights as shared above seem valuable, the following limitations should be considered before generalizing and applying our findings in the real-world context. Both Study 1 and Study 2 utilized convenient samples from a homogenous population. Participants were mostly Christians (all but one across two studies) and mostly White college-aged females from one evangelical Christian university. Therefore, to increase external validity, replication studies seem necessary.

Also, participants were asked to recall a time(s) when they were loved or hurt without any qualifications. It is unclear if there would have been any differences if they were thinking of a time when they were loved by their loved ones such as romantic partners and parents or more distant friends and neighbors. Also, participants were not chosen based on their struggle with unforgiveness, and the relational context of the hurt they recalled was not specified in this study either. Future researchers should consider more specifically examining these factors that could make a difference. For instance, if couples with a known relational conflict are recruited, researchers can ask about their memories of being loved by their partner and ask them to rate their perception of forgiveness toward that specific partner.

In this study, we specifically focused on feeling loved or hurt as a way to change one’s perception of forgiveness. However, it would also be interesting to study the effect of being forgiven or unforgiven by another on forgiveness perceptions. Would those who are forgiven of a grave injustice they committed be more likely to offer forgiveness to another who wronged them and more likely to offer forgiveness? Divine forgiveness (being forgiven by God) predicts forgiving others (Fincham & May, 2020; 2022; 2023). However, for instance, would being forgiven by a romantic partner or a parent predict the forgiveness of others?

Finally, the basic assumption in our study was that having more positive perceptions of forgiveness could lead to an increased likelihood that participants are more likely to choose forgiveness because forgiveness would seem more plausible for them. However, it is not clear if this indeed is the case. Therefore, future researchers should consider investigating in what ways one’s beliefs and perceptions about forgiveness (manipulated in some ways) lead to their actual practice of forgiveness at a later time.

Despite these limitations as well as the need for further investigations, our findings suggest that one’s perception of forgiveness can be manipulated and one’s self-efficacy beliefs about forgiveness and forgiveness perceptions as good and difficult are associated. Our findings seem to be in line with the existing literature and the current practice of promoting forgiveness in clinical practice. Therefore, researchers and practitioners are likely to benefit from considering our findings as ways to promote forgiveness as an option in therapeutic treatment.

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