Gratitude

Gratitude is a positive emotion or an attitude in acknowledgment of a tangible or intangible gift, one has received or will receive. It is the divine, the human, or even the being compared to be grateful, or all at the same time. Historically, was and is the experience of gratitude in the focus of several world religions, and it has been extensively discussed by moral philosophers such as Adam Smith in his Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759 ). The systematic study of gratitude within psychology only began around the year 2000, possibly because psychology is traditionally concerned with understanding rather negative than with the positive emotions. But since the birth of positive psychology to thankfulness is in the mainstream of psychological research.

• 5.1 The relation to the well -being
• 5.2 Relationship to the altruism
• 5.3 Psychological interventions
• 5.4 Educational Interventions

Compared with debt of gratitude

Gratitude is not the same as the feeling of " debt of gratitude ". Both feelings arise while after received help, but the feeling of indebtedness occurs when the person realizes that she is obliged to help to pay in any way. The two emotions lead to different results: debt of gratitude ( a negative emotion ) can cause the recipient of the help the helper avoid in the future, while gratitude ( a positive emotion ) can motivate the recipient to visit his benefactor, whereby the relationship between the two improved.

Reception of gratitude can change the behavior

Gratitude can also lead to the fact that positive social behavior reinforced in the benefactor. For example, it was found in an experiment that customers of a jeweler who were called and thanked after a purchase, bought later by 70 % more. For comparison, customers who were thanked and informed by a merchant, showed only a 30prozentige increase their purchases, and customers who were not called, showed no increase. In another study, patrons of a restaurant gave bigger tips when the waiter wrote "thank you" to the bill.

The main theoretical approaches

The study of the relationship between spirituality and gratitude has become common lately. If these two characteristics are certainly not dependent on each other, yet studies have found that spirituality can enhance the ability to be grateful; therefore show the people who regularly attend religious services or otherwise engage religious, probably in all of their life greater gratitude. In Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish and Hindu traditions, the gratitude is seen as a valuable human tendency. Worship with gratitude to God is a theme that is common to all these religions; Therefore, the concept of gratitude permeates religious texts, teaching contents and traditions. Thus, gratitude is one of the most important feelings that want to give and receive religions in their followers; Therefore, it is considered as a universal religious attitude.

Jewish Arrivals

In Judaism, gratitude is an essential part of worship, and it pervades every aspect of life of the believer. In the Jewish worldview everything comes from God, and therefore gratitude is a key aspect. The Hebrew Bible is full of such places; Here are two examples from the Psalms: "Lord, my God, I will praise thee for ever ," and "I want to thank you, Lord, with all my heart! " (Ps. 30.13 and Ps 9.2). Gratitude is often a part of Jewish prayers, as in the Shema, where the believer out of gratitude says "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all your soul and with all your strength. " ( Deut. 6.4). The concluding prayer, the Alenu, also speaks of gratitude by thanking God for it the special skill of the Jewish people. In addition, the pious believers pray during the day over a hundred blessings prayers called Berachot .. In Judaism, the gratitude of human kindness is emphasized. If you stop, to be selfish, you will be open to others, you learn to appreciate what they do good, and you can therefore be grateful.

In the 5th book of Genesis, God announces to punish those who " have enough " God, who has given them all these things, but do not serve " with joy and gladness of heart." Greed and envy are also branded in the Ten Commandments. To transform these natural desires in good impulses, prescribes the Jewish tradition prayers of thanksgiving ( " Bracha "), which - as part of its everyday rituals accompany the entire day's activities - especially with Orthodox Jews. Even on the Sabbath, the Catholic faithful are required to count God's blessings and to celebrate.

Christian Arrivals

It is said that gratitude memorize the whole life of the Christian. Martin Luther called gratitude " The essential Christian attitude ", and even today is gratitude "The Heart of the Gospel". Since every Christian believes to be created by a personal God, Christians are encouraged to praise their Creator, and to be grateful to him. Christian gratitude sees God as the selfless giver of all good, and it follows a strong sense of duty, which pervades all aspects of life of the believer. Gratitude in Christianity is the recognition of God's generosity that leads Christians to align his own thoughts and actions according to these ideals. Not simply a sentimental feeling, Christian gratitude is rather a virtue that not only generates emotions and thoughts, but also leads to action. After Jonathan Edwards, in his " Treatise Concerning Religious Affections ", include love and gratitude to God for the signs of true religiousness. Even modern measures of religious spirituality include reviews of gratitude to God. Samuel and Lester (1985 ) found a small test group of Catholic nuns and priests, that - among 50 possible feelings - love and gratitude were the most common feelings towards God.

Islamic Additions

The sacred text of Islam, the Koran is full of the idea of gratitude. Islam encourages believers to be thankful and give thanks to God in all circumstances. In the Quran it also says in Surah 14, that the Grateful receive more of God. A traditional Islamic saying goes that "the first to be summoned to paradise are those who have praised God in every situation ," The Prophet Muhammad also said: "Gratitude for the abundance you have received is the best guarantee that this wealth does not stop. " Many everyday activities in the Islamic faith also encourage gratitude. The column of daily prayer encourages believers to pray five times a day to God to thank him for his kindness. The column of fasting during the month of Ramadan is intended to enable the faithful in the state of gratitude.

Measurement of individual differences

Recent psychological research on gratitude is aimed at the nature of individual differences in gratitude, and to the question of what it leads to, when you're more or less grateful. Three different methods were developed to measure individual differences in gratitude; each based on a slightly different idea. The method GQ6 measures individual differences with the question of how often and how intensely people feel gratitude. The assessment scale measures 8 different aspects of gratitude: Estimation of persons, property, of the moment, rituals, reverence, emotions, social differences, existential fears, and expresses behavior that gratitude. The method GRAT assessed gratitude towards other people, gratitude towards the world in general, and the lack of dissatisfaction with what one has not. A new study has shown that all these methods of measurement actually the same method to face life measure; which suggests that individual differences in gratitude include all of these components.

Empirical results

The relation to the well -being

A great deal of recent work shows that people who are grateful, feel subjectively better. Grateful people are happier, less depressed, less stressed, and more satisfied with their lives and social relationships. Grateful people also have their environment, their personal growth, their purpose in life and self -esteem under better control. Grateful people have more positive ways to deal with the difficulties in their lives, other people ask more likely to support, grow on the basis of this experience and use more time to plan how to deal with the problem. Grateful people also have less negative coping strategies try to less easy to avoid the problem or wegzudefinieren, they blame less on themselves or deal with the problem through drug use. Grateful people sleep better, presumably because they have less negative, more positive thoughts before falling asleep.

Gratitude apparently has one of the strongest relationships with the mental health of all traits. Numerous studies suggest that grateful people are usually happier and less stressed or depressed. In a Dankbarkeitsstudie was an assigned participants at random from six therapeutic intervention that should raise the overall quality of life ( Seligman et. Al., 2005). It was found that was effected by these provisions of the greatest short-term effect of a " Dankbarkeitsbesuch ", where participants some people wrote a letter of thanks from her life area and brought about. This intervention resulted in a ten percent increase in Glücklichkeitspunkte and a significant reduction in depression points, and these changes held up to one month after the visit to. The greatest long-term effect of these six options was effected by writing " Dankbarkeitstagebüchern " to which participants were asked to write down three things each day for which they were grateful. The Glücklichkeitspunkte these participants were more and continued to rise, while they were tested periodically after the experiment. The greatest successes usually presented themselves even about six months after the start of the investigation. This exercise was so successful that many participants - although only asked to keep the diary for a week - the diary further led for a long time when the study was over. Similar results were also Emmons and McCullough ( 2003). and Lyubomirsky et. al. (2005).

Although many emotions and personality traits are essential for the well -being, it is shown that gratitude is probably particularly important. First, a longitudinal study showed that more grateful people with the change into a new stage of life coping better. Specifically: people who were more grateful before the change were, three months later less stressed, less depressed and more satisfied with their relationships. Second, two recent studies have shown that gratitude may have a unique relationship to well-being, and that they can explain aspects of well-being that other personality traits can not explain.

Relation to altruism

It has also shown that gratitude improves the altruism of man. A study conducted by David DeSteno and Monica Bartlett study has found that gratitude correlates with generous donation willingness. This study has shown using a money game that greater gratitude leads directly to larger donations. This means that grateful people are more likely to Reset personal benefits for the sake of the common advantage ( DeSteno & Bartlett, 2010). One of McCullough, Emmons, & Tsang (2002) study found similar correlations between gratitude and empathy, generosity and willingness to help.

Psychological interventions

So there apparently gratitude has a strong influence on the well -being, some psychological intervention methods have been developed to strengthen gratitude. For example, let Watkins and colleagues test takers try different Dankbarkeitsübungen, for example, think of a living person, the one is grateful, writing about someone, which one is grateful, or write a letter to someone to whom one is grateful. Test participants in the control group should describe their living room. Participants who had taken part in a Dankbarkeitsübung showed immediately after exercise will strengthen their positive feelings, and this was strongest among those whose duty it was to think of a person they are grateful. For participants who were from the outset grateful people, was the benefit of Dankbarkeitsübungen greatest. See also " Dankbarkeitstagebücher " above.

Educational interventions

The American family therapist Wendy Mogel has the theme of " Gratitude" a chapter in her influential book, The Blessings of a Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise dedicated Self- Reliant Children ( 2001). Insatiable desire for new things and lack of gratitude are key abnormalities of many children who are introduced to her in their practice. As basis for a Dankbarkeitserziehung Mogel recommends parents to set firstly by their own behavior a good example. Second, they should introduce in their home, a culture of self- Bedankens; This not only good habits are practiced, but also the child's attention focused on the goods and advantages enjoyed it ordinary. Requests may also not constantly go immediately fulfilled, because the less a child is accustomed to endure yearnings, the lower is its capacity for satisfaction and gratitude. Mogel points out that children also naturally talented experts for trivial pleasures are small, which are easily overlooked by adults; Parents should train their attention to this ability of their child. To further raise awareness of the child for the benefits it enjoys, it recommends parents beyond the child to get used to it early, perform selfless good deeds (such as a sick friend to write a Aufmunterungsbrief, rather than about complain that the play date fails).

Concluding Remarks

According to Cicero, "Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the other " is. Many studies have shown the relationship between gratitude and well-being not only for the individual but for all the people affected. The positive psychology has taken up these studies and begun to take exercises to reinforce gratitude in their area, thereby increasing the overall well -being. Gratitude was indeed neglected in the past by psychology, in recent years, but there was great progress in the study of gratitude and its positive effects.