The Roles of Shame and Poor Self-Concept in Explaining Low Social Connection Among Adult Survivors of Childhood Emotional Maltreatment

Emotional maltreatment (EM) is the most common retrospectively self-reported form of child abuse/neglect. One potential negative outcome for EM survivors is a lack of social connection (SC; i.e., feeling interpersonally distant from others, socially uncomfortable, etc.). Explanations of the link between EM and low SC, however, are insufficiently tested. Theory and empirical work point to shame as a ubiquitous consequence of EM that negatively affects self-concept and is also associated with low SC in adulthood.

Objective

We test the hypothesis that experiences of EM lead to shame that impairs the development of social self-concept and, ultimately, one's sense of SC.

Participants and setting

We collected self-report data from 244 American college students.

Method

Using structural equation modeling, we tested shame and social self-concept as sequential mediators of the path from EM to SC.

Results

Shame and social self-concept mediated the relationship between EM and SC, bringing this direct path below significance. Social self-concept partially mediated shame and SC. Overall, our model accounted for 77% of the variability in SC.

Conclusions

Children subjected to EM by caregivers are likely to experience themselves as deeply flawed (i.e., shame) and have difficulty developing a secure sense of themselves, especially as relational beings. Our results suggest that when shame interferes with the development of a positive social self-concept, survivors of EM are at-risk for low SC. Treatment implications include a focus on healing shame and building social self-concept.