Granting forgiveness or harboring grudges: Implications for emotion, physiology, and health

Interpersonal offenses frequently mar relationships. Theorists have argued that the responses victims adopt toward their offenders have ramifications not only for their cognition, but also for their emotion, physiology, and h ealth. This study examined the immediate emotional and physiological effect s that occurred when participants (35 females, 36 males) rehearsed hurtful memories and nursed grudges (i.e., were unforgiving) compared with when the y cultivated empathic perspective taking and imagined granting forgiveness (i.e., were forgiving) toward real-life offenders. Unforgiving thoughts pro mpted more aversive emotion, and significantly higher corrugator (brow) ele ctromyogram (EMG), skin conductance, heart rate, and blood pressure changes from baseline. The EMG, skin conductance, and heart rate effects persisted after imagery into the recovery periods. Forgiving thoughts prompted great er perceived control and comparatively lower physiological stress responses . The results dovetail with the psychophysiology literature and suggest pos sible mechanisms through which chronic unforgiving responses may erode heal th whereas forgiving responses may enhance it.