The information threat theory of shame

Throughout their evolutionary history, the survival and reproduction of humans have hinged on receiving aid. But others would deliver aid—or withhold it—depending on how much they valued the target individual’s welfare, which was itself a function of whether, in their estimation, the individual’s existence and choices afforded them more fitness benefits than costs. Thus, indications that one’s welfare became less valuable to others would have posed an adaptive problem for ancestral humans. The shame system appears to be an evolved solution to this problem. Shame orchestrates regulatory systems to (i) deter actions whose reputational costs exceed their personal benefit, (ii) prevent negative information about the self from reaching others, and (iii) minimize the costs of being devalued when devaluation occurs. Concealment, appeasement, and aggression are among the context-sensitive tactics the shame system deploys to reduce the likelihood and costs of being devalued—and punished, shunned, or killed—by others. The social-evaluative psychology that selected for shame and other reputation-management adaptations is evident in both small-scale interactions and broader societal institutions. For example, the intensity of shame individuals anticipate at the prospect of committing specific offenses closely matches the severity of punishments prescribed for those offenses by both modern and millennia-old criminal codes. Because shame causes psychological pain and can sometimes trigger hostile responses, some researchers have dubbed it an “ugly” and “maladaptive” emotion. However, careful adaptationist analysis suggests that it is a well-engineered mechanism for minimizing the threat of being devalued.