Document Type
Undergraduate Thesis
Publication Date
Spring 5-1-2024
Journal
Undergraduate Honours Theses
Abstract
Forgiveness plays a pivotal role in navigating social relationships, especially within friendship groups, by helping victims resolve transgressions, restore peace, and overcome negative emotions (Raj et al., 2016). Often, victims consult close friends or family, referred to as third parties, when deciding whether to forgive (Eaton, 2013). Previous research has primarily focused on the forgiveness of infidelity within romantic relationships, examining the causes and associations related to the couple or couple members (DiDonato et al., 2015). This study shifts from the traditional emphasis on romantic relationships and infidelity to explore the dynamics of third-party forgiveness within friendships and social circles. Specifically, it examines how the closeness of third parties to the perpetrator and their beliefs about justice influence their decisions to either validate or minimize an act of friendship betrayal. The study investigates third-party responses to a betrayal scenario where the victim is a close friend, and the perpetrator is either another close friend or an acquaintance. They then completed various questionnaires assessing their moral appraisals of the transgression and their tendency to validate or minimize the victim’s experience. Results indicated that closeness to the perpetrator did not significantly influence the minimization or validation of the victim’s experience. Additionally, justice perceptions of the transgression did not differ between conditions. The implications of these findings are discussed.
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Notes
Thesis Advisor(s): Dr. Irene Cheung