I’m Michael Lewis, I’m University Distinguished Professor of Pediatrics and Psychiatry and director of the Institute for the Study of Child Development at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. I’m also Professor of Psychology, Education, Cognitive Science, and Biomedical Engineering at Rutgers University. I talked on shame and coping style, and individual differences as they apply to sex education.

What is your definition of “shame”?
Shame is a very complex emotion, where you feel like you want to die, hide, and disappear. And you want to do that because the self has been damaged and injured. It is, perhaps, the most powerful negative human emotion we have.

What is the difference between shame and guilt?
Shame and guilt differ in one very important way. While shame is a damaged self, guilt is a damaged behavior, but the self is intact. So in shame, you collapse because you’re no good. In guilt, the idea is to repair the damage, because it’s an action which caused the damage.

How do shame and guilt affect our sexuality?
Shame and guilt are very much a part of the human experience, and they are often displayed in situations that have to do with the body. Individuals differ in how much shame or guilt they express in terms of bodily function. And if we want to educate people about their sexual lives, we have to be prepared to understand that differences, in shame especially, will affect how they can be educated.

Closing statements…
I think, if we are interested in educating people about their sexuality, we not only have to be concerned about the messages we give to people – what we tell them – but we also have to be concerned about individual differences, and how they receive the message. And so we have to tailor our messages to the needs of individuals.