Wstyd jako emocja wywoływana społecznie
Shame as a socially incited emotion

Summary/Abstract: The article discusses shame from the perspective of social sciences and particularly its functions and role as a means of social control and the creation of personal identity. The principal assumption is that shame is a socially incited emotion, at the same time strongly conditioned by people around. Different categories of shame are associated with the community and the witness’ perception of deviations from collectively agreed standards. The article presents a typology consisting of four variants of shame: sincere (genuine) and pretended (simulated) shame as well as primary and secondary one. This typology is supplemented by a brief description of functional aspects of shame from the identity perspective; encompassing regulative and controlling, defining, adaptive and conservative-protective function. At the individual’s identity level, shame is presented as a factor shaping individual’s identity by determining one’s key values. In addition, it affects actor’s self-perception, mainly by defining axiological standards and indicating the criteria according to which self-assessment is performed. At the socio-normative level, however, shame may be evoked as a result of confrontation with various social groups, their expectations, normative systems and response to the inconsistency of rules and roles in social interactions.

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