The role of visual perspective on emotion regulation in autobiographical memory related to guilt and shame

This study aims to examine the effect of visual perspective (first-person and third-person) on emotion regulation when individuals recall autobiographical memories related to self-conscious emotions such as guilt and shame. In this context, subtypes of guilt (justified and maladaptive) and shame (internal and external) were considered, and how these emotional categories relate to visual perspective preference and emotional intensity was investigated using an experimental design. It was hypothesized that individuals experiencing external shame would use the third-person perspective more frequently compared to those recalling memories associated with internal shame or neutral events. Similarly, participants recalling justified guilt-related memories were expected to use the third-person perspective more than those in the maladaptive guilt or neutral groups. Furthermore, it was proposed that participants in the external shame and justified guilt groups who recalled their memories from a third-person perspective would report higher emotional intensity than those using a first-person perspective. On the other hand, individuals experiencing internal shame or maladaptive guilt were expected to prefer the first-person perspective more than those recalling neutral or other types of emotional memories, and that these memories would lead to higher emotional intensity when recalled from a first-person perspective compared to a third-person perspective. The sample consisted of 124 participants aged between 18 and 55. During the study, participants were asked to write an autobiographical memory related to one of five emotion categories (internal shame, external shame, justified guilt, maladaptive guilt, neutral), and to later mentally reconstruct the memory from either a first-person or third-person perspective, based on the condition to which they were randomly assigned. Emotional responses were measured before and after the task, and the phenomenological features of the memories and perspective types were analyzed. To assess participants' mental health status, the Beck Depression Inventory-II and the Beck Anxiety Inventory were administered; individuals scoring above the clinical cutoff were excluded from analysis. The Autobiographical Memory Characteristics Questionnaire was used to evaluate the qualitative features of the memories, and participants' emotional states were measured via a 5-point Likert scale that included 11 core emotions. Hypotheses were tested using independent samples t-tests and Kruskal-Wallis tests. The findings revealed that none of the hypotheses were statistically supported. However, a moderate effect size was observed in the internal shame group, suggesting that recalling memories from a first-person perspective may lead to greater emotional intensity compared to a third-person perspective. These results indicate that the effect of visual perspective on emotional experience is not unidirectional or automatic; rather, it is shaped by individual differences, the personal meaning attributed to the event, and mental representations. It is suggested that visual perspective may function not only as a means of creating emotional distance but also as a psychological mechanism for avoidance, emotional identification, or cognitive reframing. In this regard, the study contributes to a deeper understanding of how self-conscious emotions are represented in autobiographical memory and how these representations interact with emotion regulation strategies. We suggested that future research should consider contextual variables and individual differences in a more comprehensive manner.