The role of honour concerns in emotional reactions to offences

We investigated the role of honour concerns in mediating the effect of nati onality and gender on the reported intensity of anger and shame in reaction to insult vignettes. Spain, an honour culture, and The Netherlands, where honour is of less central significance, were selected for comparison. A tot al of 260 (125 Dutch, 135 Spanish) persons participated in the research. Pa rticipants completed a measure of honour concerns and answered questions ab out emotional reactions of anger and shame to vignettes depicting insults i n which type of threat was manipulated. It was found that Spanish participa nts responded especially intensely to insults that threaten family honour, and that this effect of nationality on emotional reactions to threats to fa mily honour was mediated by individual differences in concern for family ho nour.