Thank you, everyone who emailed, Facebooked and Tweeted us the NPR story on the psychological benefits of NOT apologizing. As is so often the case, the study in question is far more nuanced than the grabby headline (“Why Not Apologizing Makes You Feel Better”) might lead you to believe.

The NPR story does say early on that “there is abundant research on the psychological value of apologizing.” (Semi-inexplicably, NPR’s link is to a site about post-apartheid reparations in South Africa rather than another study about apology research with citations…but never fear, I shall provide some for you! Keep reading!)

The study in the NPR story is small (288 participants) but smart. Let us evaluate it. It points out that there’s a lot of research on apologizing and not much on not apologizing — so we do have a data gap. This is one study, and good science is built on a multitude of studies. There’s also a methodological issue at play here: How do you figure out if someone who doesn’t apologize would feel better if he or she did apologize? We can’t know for sure the effects of a thing that didn’t happen. Finally, a study that necessarily depends on self-reported data about feelings is inherently thorny. People are very good at self-justification, and tend to say that the choices they’ve made are the right ones. The study’s three Aussie authors — Tyler Okimoto of the University of Queensland Business School in Brisbane, Michael Wenzel of the Flingers University School of Psychology in Adelaide, and Kyli Hedrick of the Victoria University School of Social Sciences and Psychology in Melbourne — put it  in  fancypants academic language:

Paradoxically, a “refusal'” to apologize may also offer the same psychological value to a harm-doer. Refusing to admit to a wrong helps to maintain consistency between the harm-doer’s actions and his or her idealized self-concept. Indeed, people are often motivated toward self-consistency even when the resulting attribution is negative (Lecky, 1945). Thus, even though defending a negative behavior may insinuate a less benevolent character, the act of refusing to apologize may still help facilitate perceptions of self-consistency, reducing self-oriented dissonance and enhancing feelings of value integrity.

None of this means the study is bad. It’s just important that our takeaway isn’t HA HA I DO NOT HAVE TO APOLOGIZE AND I WILL FEEL NIFTY.

So here’s what our intrepid authors actually found: A big difference between apologizers and non-apologizers is that (der) apologizers tended to feel more sorry than non-apologizers, but non-apologizers tended to feel more power, control and “value integrity” (the sense of being true to themselves). Wisely, the authors point out that there’s a difference between failing to apologize and refusing to apologize — we may feel regret for not apologizing when we know we’ve done wrong and have been passive or wimpy or fearful about saying no or missing the window of opportunity to right a wrong, but we’re less likely to feel that way when we’ve made a conscious choice not to say we’re sorry. So convincing yourself that HA HA I DO NOT HAVE TO APOLOGIZE AND I WILL FEEL NIFTY may not help you feel nifty at all if you really are sorry but are having a hard time being facing up to your guilt. It’s not easy to be brave, to be conciliatory to your victim, a person who may reject your apology. Finally, we need more research on whether not apologizing for legal reasons — because you’re worried how a judge or jury will assess your culpability — affects your sense of self.

There is a bunch of research showing that apologizing is better than not apologizing.  One study found that bankrupcy judges gave more favorable rulings to debtors who apologized than those who didn’t. Another found that when an accused wrongdoer apologized in court, juries were less likely to return a finding of negligence. “We know victims often respond favorably to an apology, but our findings suggest that even unharmed jurors react in a similar manner,” said one of the latter study’s authors, Robert Cornell of Oklahoma State, in a OSU press release. “Offering an apology though is not synonymous with admitting guilt.” (Here’s a compilation of evidence that, as Cornell said, victims respond favorably to apology.)

OK, but those studies are about apologies’ effects on the victim, not on the perp, right? Right. But we know from other studies (a bunch are cited here, and we’ll go into the nitty-gritty of some in another post) that feeling guilt (as opposed to shame, which can make us shut down instead of reaching out) and seeking forgiveness can help mend relationships. People with a pro-social orientation tend to be healthier, more connected to others and less stressed than those without such an orientation. Rest assured we’ll post more about this in the future.