ABSTRACT
After reading these 32 chapters on forgiveness research, we take stock of changes that have occurred within the subfield of forgiveness studies from 2004 (when the first edition of the Handbook was compiled) up to 2019. We noted big trends in defining forgiveness (consensus has diminished since the first edition), calling for research attention to processes regarding the offender and victim’s interaction, assessing forgiveness (measures have proliferated, and have been translated into many languages, with psychometric evidence supplied), understanding forgiveness (theoretical perspectives have been put forward), seeking to describe how forgiveness of others, forgiveness of self, forgiveness by God, and societal forgiveness are interrelated, and promoting forgiveness (much more is known about the nuances of helping people forgive). Perhaps the biggest new development is the overwhelming attention that has been lavished on cultural elements of forgiveness. Some fields have grown virally, such as forgiveness and health, while others have either experienced modest growth (forgiveness in relationships and in organizations) or failed to coalesce (the development of forgiveness in children). We describe what we believe to be a good research agenda for the field over the next 10 years or so.
