The expectation is that one with breeding and manners should always make amends for the human ‘error’ of erring. Decorum says that after doing anything from the stupid and silly to the evil and insane must instantly be followed by a ‘coming clean’ atonement. Yet this is never pleasant.
So why do we do it? Research has taken the view, to support the common wisdom, that there are immense psychological benefits to saying you’re sorry.
No one has asked the reverse question being: “if so many people don’t like doing it there must be mental health benefits in not apologising.”
Not necessarily so say Australian researchers Tyler G. Okimoto, Michael Wenzel and Kyli Hedrick reported on what they've found happens in people's minds when they refuse to apologize.
They discovered that the adage ‘saying sorry will make you feel better’ may now not be best practice.
"We do find that apologies do make apologizers feel better, but the interesting thing is that refusals to apologize also make people feel better and, in fact, in some cases it makes them feel better than an apology would have," Okimoto admits with no sense of sorry.
Feeling empowered
Ironically when you refuse to apologize, it actually makes you feel more empowered. That power and control seems to translate into greater feelings of self-worth.
The group surveyed 228 people and asked them to remember a time they had done something wrong. Most people remembered relatively trivial offenses, but some remembered serious transgressions, including crimes such as theft.
The researchers then asked the people whether they had apologised, or made a decision not to apologize even though they knew they were in the wrong. And they also divided the people at random and asked some to compose an email where they apologised for their actions, or compose an email refusing to apologise.