Exploring the nature of hurt feelings

Hurt feelings are an inevitable consequence of interpersonal relationships. Hurt can be defined as the responses to trauma, abuse, loss, stress, rejection, insults, and offenses that may occur throughout life. The purpose of the series of studies outlined in this dissertation was two-fold: (1) to develop a reliable and valid personality measure of the bimodal model of hurt reactivity comprising introjective hurt (i.e., internalizing hurt and engaging in self-blame) and retaliatory hurt (i.e., lashing out immediately and aggressively against perpetrators of hurt); and (2) to assess the meaning and implications of hurt from various methodological perspectives, including narrative accounts of hurt experiences and their outcomes over time and the exploration of hurt in a hypothetical paradigm. Results indicated that the Introjective and Retaliatory dimensions of the Hurt Reactivity Scale were differentially related to various indices of similar and related personality constructs. Similarly, each scale was predictive of the cognitive, emotional and behavioral reactions that are characteristic of each response pattern in the longitudinal studies of hurt. Moreover, the results of the hypothetical study showed that intentionality is strongly associated with the angry retaliation found in the retaliatory hurt personality and also evidenced in the selfpunitive and dependent responses of the introjective hurt predisposition.