Guilt is a moral emotion that occurs when a person believes or realizes—accurately or not—that they have compromised their own standards of conduct or have violated universal moral standards and bear significant responsibility for that violation. Guilt is closely related to the concept of remorse, regret, as well as shame.
Hubris, or less frequently hybris, describes a personality quality of extreme or excessive pride or dangerous overconfidence and complacency, often in combination with arrogance. The term arrogance comes from the Latin adrogare, meaning "to feel that one has a right to demand certain attitudes and behaviors from other people". To arrogate means "to claim or seize without justification... To make undue claims to having", or "to claim or seize without right... to ascribe or attribute without reason". The term pretension is also associated with the term hubris, but is not synonymous with it.
The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices or cardinal sins, is a grouping and classification of vices within Christian, particularly Catholic, teachings. According to the standard list, they are pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth, which are contrary to the seven heavenly virtues.
Courage is the choice and willingness to confront agony, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. Valor is courage or bravery, especially in battle.
Self-esteem is confidence in one's own worth, abilities, or morals. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs about oneself as well as emotional states, such as triumph, despair, pride, and shame. Smith and Mackie define it by saying "The self-concept is what we think about the self; self-esteem, is the positive or negative evaluations of the self, as in how we feel about it ."
Shame is an unpleasant self-conscious emotion often associated with negative self-evaluation; motivation to quit; and feelings of pain, exposure, distrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness.
Positive psychology studies the conditions that contribute to the optimal functioning of people, groups, and institutions. It studies "positive subjective experience, positive individual traits, and positive institutions... it aims to improve quality of life."
Humility is the quality of being humble. Dictionary definitions accentuate humility as low self-regard and sense of unworthiness. In a religious context, humility can mean a recognition of self in relation to a deity, and subsequent submission to that deity as a member of that religion. Outside of a religious context, humility is defined as being "unselved"—liberated from consciousness of self—a form of temperance that is neither having pride nor indulging in self-deprecation.
Self-love, defined as "love of self" or "regard for one's own happiness or advantage", has been conceptualized both as a basic human necessity and as a moral flaw, akin to vanity and selfishness, synonymous with amour-propre, conceitedness, egotism, narcissism, et al. However, throughout the 20th and 21st centuries self-love has adopted a more positive connotation through pride parades, Self-Respect Movement, self-love protests, the hippie era, the modern feminist movement, as well as the increase in mental health awareness that promotes self-love as intrinsic to self-help and support groups working to prevent substance abuse and suicide.
The term hamartia derives from the Greek ἁμαρτία, from ἁμαρτάνειν hamartánein, which means "to miss the mark" or "to err". It is most often associated with Greek tragedy, although it is also used in Christian theology. The term is often said to depict the flaws or defects of a character and portraying these as the reason of a potential downfall. However, other critics point to the term's derivation and say that it refers only to a tragic but random accident or mistake, with devastating consequences but with no judgment implied as to the character.
Self-consciousness is a heightened sense of awareness of oneself. It is not to be confused with consciousness in the sense of qualia. Historically, "self-consciousness" was synonymous with "self-awareness", referring to a state of awareness that one exists and that one has consciousness. While "self-conscious" and "self-aware" are still sometimes used interchangeably, particularly in philosophy, "self-consciousness" has commonly come to refer to a preoccupation with oneself, especially with how others might perceive one's appearance or one's actions. An unpleasant feeling of self-consciousness may occur when one realizes that one is being watched or observed, the feeling that "everyone is looking" at oneself. Some people are habitually more self-conscious than others. Unpleasant feelings of self-consciousness sometimes become associated with shyness or paranoia.
Narcissism is a self–centered personality style characterized as having an excessive preoccupation with oneself and one's own needs, often at the expense of others.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the human self:
Self-acceptance is acceptance of self.
Self-enhancement is a type of motivation that works to make people feel good about themselves and to maintain self-esteem. This motive becomes especially prominent in situations of threat, failure or blows to one's self-esteem. Self-enhancement involves a preference for positive over negative self-views. It is one of the three self-evaluation motives along with self-assessment and self-verification . Self-evaluation motives drive the process of self-regulation, that is, how people control and direct their own actions.
Envy is an emotion which occurs when a person lacks another's quality, skill, achievement, or possession and wishes that the other lacked it.
The self-discrepancy theory states that individuals compare their "actual" self to internalized standards or the "ideal/ought self". Inconsistencies between "actual", "ideal" and "ought" are associated with emotional discomforts. Self-discrepancy is the gap between two of these self-representations that leads to negative emotions.
Reverence is "a feeling or attitude of deep respect tinged with awe; veneration". Reverence involves a humbling of the self in respectful recognition of something perceived to be greater than the self.
Mark Richard Leary is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University. His research has made significant contributions to the fields of social psychology and personality psychology.
Moral emotions are a variety of social emotions that are involved in forming and communicating moral judgments and decisions, and in motivating behavioral responses to one's own and others' moral behavior. As defined by Jonathan Haidt, moral emotions "are linked to the interests or welfare either of a society as a whole or at least of persons other than the judge or agent". A person may not always have clear words to articulate, yet simultaneously, that same person knows it to be true deep down inside.
