The benefits of group-based pride: Pride can motivate guilt in intergroup conflicts among high glorifiers

Group-based guilt and acknowledging responsibility for collective moral transgressions are an important part of conflict resolution. However, they are not a common phenomenon. This is particularly true during intergroup conflict, and among those group members who glorify their group and see it as superior to others. In the current research we investigated ways to increase group-based guilt among group members who tend to glorify their group. We reasoned that satisfying the motivation behind group glorification may counteract its negative association with group-based guilt. In two studies, conducted during the 2014 Gaza war, we demonstrated that inducing conflict-related group-based pride among high glorifiers can increase group-based guilt for group actions during the same conflict; effectively regulating one group-based emotion by regulating another. The possible mechanism and implications are discussed.