Guilt measures tied to a specific stated cause outperform diffuse ethnic-identity guilt items.

Evidence

The fifth and eighth items were supposed to measure White guilt (“I feel guilt about the past and present social inequality of Black and White Americans”; “There are times when I feel guilt due to my association with the White race”). Because the two items were not strongly correlated with each other, r(50) = .44, p < .01, the first item seemed to be a better measure of guilt because it specified the reason for the guilt, and the first item was more similar to items used in Study 1. Only results for this first measure will be reported. — Janet K. Swim and Deborah L. Miller, White Guilt, 96

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to psychometric debates about single-specified-cause items versus general associative items; also relevant to how shame/guilt differ by specificity in appraisal theory. — connects to: Broad national identification measures fail to predict collective guilt reliably — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt: International…, 858; Categorizing at a broader level diffuses responsibility and lowers collective guilt — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt: International…, 2117
• SHARE: A researcher measuring collective guilt would care about the decision to drop the identity-anchored item because it correlated only moderately with the cause-specified item.

Broader Connections

• Broad national identification measures fail to predict collective guilt reliably #corroborates (0.85) — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt, 858
• Categorizing at a broader level diffuses responsibility and lowers collective guilt #expands (0.80) — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt, 2117