Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being?

Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being?

Yuko Sakai

Brigham Young University- Idaho

Ahora Foundation

December 14, 2020

 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 2

Abstract

Gratitude intervention has been drawing bigger attention from many researchers in some fields. It

is noticed that gratitude may give a positive influence on one’s daily life in various aspects. This

paper argues that gratitude can enhance one’s mental, social, and physical wellbeing. Gratitude

can reduce stress, help people be happier, and boost their life satisfaction (Arya & Khandelwal,

2014, p.476). Appreciation towards other people’s kind acts motivates adolescents to attain more

prosocial behaviors in the future. Researchers found that gratitude creates a spiral of positive

actions in a society (Froh, Bono, & Emmons, 2010, p. 152). Moreover, Mills et al. (2015) found

that gratitude is related to a low risk of heart failure, cardiovascular disease, fatigue, and even

inflammation. It is also demonstrated that gratitude enhances sleep quality (Wood, et al., 2009).

Some counterarguments insist that these studies may not be necessarily accurate because of some

biases. However, enormous researchers have studied the same topic and we see enough correlation

to say that gratitude does have positive impacts on one’s wellbeing (Boggiss, et al., 2020, p. 8).

Keywords: Gratitude, stress, well-being, anxiety, happiness, prosocial

 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 3

Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being?

“Warau Kado niwa fuku kitaru.” This Japanese saying means that good fortune and

happiness will come to the home of those who appreciate and smile often. This has been

inherited in the country for more than a thousand years and people still relate to this saying

nowadays. It is a widely accepted concept that gratitude can enhance one’s life. People say that

those who are grateful and happy are more likely to live longer. Gratitude brings a smile to

people’s faces. It fills our daily life with a sense of satisfaction, joy, and happiness.

In “Doctrine and Covenants”, which is a volume of scriptures read by the Church of

Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, it promises tremendous blessings on those who express

gratitude to their God. It says: “And he who receiveth all things with thankfulness shall be made

glorious; and the things of this earth shall be added unto him, even an hundred fold, yea, more

(p.148). It seems that gratitude has been applied to various people’s daily lives for their enhanced

experiences.

Although we have all heard before that gratitude enriches one’s life, it is very rare to find

an educational institution that focuses on teaching students the importance of gratitude. While

everyone seems to agree that gratitude brings success in their lives, not many seem to care. Many

researchers have done studies on this topic in the past and some are currently in the process. Some

researchers say that gratitude can enrich one’s life to a huge extent while others say that they cannot
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 4

prove the influence of being grateful. Does gratitude enhance one’s well-being? If so, how can we

prove that it is true? We found that gratitude does improve one’s physical, social, and mental

wellbeing.

What is Gratitude?

Gratitude is a well-known concept throughout the world. We all share a similar definition.

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, it is defined as “a strong feeling of appreciation to

someone or something for what the person has done to help you”. Related words shown are

“thankfulness”, “appreciate”, “bless”, “debt”, and others. To have gratitude, first, we need to

perceive what is going on around us. Second, we need to adjust our perspective to count the good

aspects of our lives. Lastly, we must recognize that these good aspects do not always flow into our

lives naturally. These steps will help us to acknowledge the value of what we have and be grateful.

According to Jans-Beken et al. (2019), gratitude is described as both a state and a trait. It

introduces: “State gratitude is an attribution-dependent or affective-cognitive state based on the

ability to be empathic, resulting from both appraising a received benefit as a positive outcome as

well as recognizing that this positive outcome stems from an external source” (p. 1). And “trait

gratitude can be viewed as a wider life orientation towards noticing and being grateful for the

positive in the world” (p. 1). In other words, state gratitude is a temporal condition of being grateful

while trait gratitude is more a stable and lasting character.

 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 5

Lines of Argument

Mental Influences

Gratitude has a strong correlation with happiness and life satisfaction. Arya &

Khandelwal (2014) found that having grateful thoughts improves one’s self-worth and self-esteem,

which leads people to gain more positive life experiences. Boosted self-worth and self-esteem

helps people to manage stressful situations and traumatic experiences (p.476). Also, Mills et al.

(2015) observed 186 men and women for three months and found that gratitude is associated

greatly with less depressed mood. Arya & Khandelwal (2014) stated that those who have less

gratitude are more likely to feel unhappy (p.474). As predicted, many researchers have found

positive effects on one’s emotions.

Gratitude can influence mental disorders, along with temporal emotions. When one’s

mind is filled with positive emotions, the person will gain stronger protection from mental

disorders. Gratitude has a huge possibility to be used in clinical settings for patients with mental

illness. Woodworth et al. (2016) have studied 295 participants for six months suggested that

positive psychology interventions (PPIs) as a useful clinical approach to reduce depression and

enhance one’s mental well-being (p. 218). PPIs include a gratitude visit, three good things in life,

and two other activities. A gratitude visit is an activity to write a letter of appreciation to whom a

patient is grateful for but never had a chance to appreciate. Then, the patient is asked to give the
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 6

thank you letter to the person. For three good things in life activity, patients are asked to write

down three good things that happened each day and give a short explanation of them. These

activities are meant to generate a sense of gratitude in each participant. The latter two activities,

which are not originally meant to generate gratitude, play important roles in enhancing one’s

mental well-being as well. Although the whole process of the program is not complete without

them, we can still consider the results of this study to see if gratitude has a positive relationship

with one’s well-being.

Woodworth et al. (2016) have found that patients who participated in PPIs reported more

happiness and less depression than the placebo group who did not receive PPIs treatment. Thus, it

became clear that gratitude is a significant component to enhance one’s psychological health and

well-being. Based on the result, they concluded that spreading this idea can make a huge difference

in the clinical field because PPIs cost much less than the usual interventions used currently (p.

219). Applying gratitude intervention to the clinical field will allow more people to receive mental

support more easily.

Not only statistically but the correlation can be explained biologically also. Now we know

that gratitude produces happiness, and it is also studied that the human brain produces positive

chemicals when it feels happy. Dfarhud et al. (2014) have researched this topic and found that

feeling happiness resulted in releasing certain kinds of hormones and glands such as Cortisol,
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 7

Adrenaline, and Oxytocin. When these are released in the human brain, we gain better control over

our emotions. Thus, they concluded that happiness benefits our mental states.

Also, in the same study, Woodworth et al. (2016) stated that when people feel happiness,

their brains release some neurotransmitters such as dopamine, endorphin, serotonin, and melatonin.

Each neurotransmitter has various positive effects on our mental states. Dopamine promotes us to

be positive, motivated and even focused. Endorphin is also known to reduce pain in the body and

produced as we exercise, love, laugh, eat chocolates, and so forth. When one’s level of endorphin

is low, the person is more likely to feel depressed. Serotonin has a fundamental role to establish a

calm mindset and to promote activate thinking. It helps people to overcome stress. Lastly,

melatonin contributes to a better quality of sleep and to have a stable mental state. As you can see,

these neurotransmitters, which are produced by happiness, have significant benefits on people’s

mental well-being.

Social Influences

Froh, Bono, & Emmons (2010) found that feeling gratitude in early adolescent

significantly affects their social well-being. Froh, Bono, & Emmons asked 700 middle school

students in New York to participate in the study (2010). To find the correlation between gratitude

and social well-being of the students, they used four measurements in the study: gratitude adjective

checklist, child social behavior questionnaire, multidimensional students’ satisfaction with life
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 8

scale, and the engaged living in youth scale. Each tool measures students’ gratitude, prosocial

behavior, life satisfaction, and social integration. As expected, it turned out that these four elements

have strong relationships with each other. The more the students were grateful, the more they were

confident, satisfied, and willing to give back to the world by using their strength. Based on the

results, the article concluded that gratitude has a positive impact on the social-emotional

development of adolescents.

As mentioned in the previous paragraph, some additional studies demonstrated that sense

gratitude towards other people can stimulate prosocial behaviors (Kitamura, 2018, p. 179). Bartlett

& DeSteno (2006) found that gratitude motivates people to stay connected with others (p. 234).

According to Froh, Bono, & Emmons (2010), “Gratitude is more than a feeling as it drives people

to return the benefit we have received” (p. 152). When kindness is offered by someone, we feel

grateful and grateful people are more likely to make a move to give back by extending support to

those they appreciate. Gratitude has an energizing and motivating quality. Human society consists

of constant repetition of giving, receiving, and repaying, therefore, gratitude is a crucial component

for a harmonized human life.

Also, Arya & Khandelwal (2014) found that grateful people are more likely to seek help

from others (p. 476). Being grateful means that one is observative and aware of environmental

issues and their brain pays more attention to the world around them. In that way, grateful people
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 9

are quick to realize any opportunities that can be helpful and they take advantage of them. When

a problem arises, those who are grateful tend to take positive actions by utilizing resources from

society.

Physical Influences

Many researchers have found that those who are grateful are more likely to experience

positive physical well-being. In fact, Wood et al. (2009) examined if sleep quality was related to

any of the personality traits. They found that those who have the traits to often feel grateful tend

to have better sleep quality. 401 men and women from various age groups participated in the

study. The researchers measured the level of their gratitude, pre-sleep quality, sleep quality,

personality, and social desirability from each participant. They found that these elements have

strong correlations with each other. The article says: “Gratitude was uniquely related to total

sleep quality, subjective sleep quality, sleep latency, sleep duration, and daytime dysfunction”

(Wood et al., 2009). They demonstrated that having negative thoughts disturbs gaining good pre-

sleep but gratitude helps to diminish these negative thoughts. Good quality of pre-sleep leads to

better sleep quality, therefore, we can say that gratitude enhances one’s sleep quality. Sleep

quality has a huge influence on the efficiency of daily activities, thus, it is no exaggeration to say

that gratitude can influence one’s physical well-being.

Moreover, gratitude is related to a low risk of heart failure, cardiovascular disease,

 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 10

fatigue, and inflammation (Mills et al., 2015). Millstein et al. (2016) have studied 156 patients

who suffer from acute coronary syndrome (ACS) for 6 months and found that gratitude and

optimism may help one to recover from ACS (p. 1). Gratitude and optimism reduce depression

and anxiety. Then, reduced depression and anxiety decrease the possibility of having additional

cardiac events. It also lowers the death rate of ACS patients. Thus, they concluded that gratitude

and optimism can enhance the physical health of ACS patients. Figure 1 shows the association

with gratitude and various factors that are related to ACS patients’ well-being.

Millstein et al. (2016) claims that these results need to be emphasized more in clinical
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 11

settings so heart failure patients can benefit from gratitude intervention for their recovery.

Especially, heart failure has been a major health concern in the United States and other countries

for a long time. Every year, more than 2.5 million people are hospitalized because of coronary

syndrome (Huffman et al., 2016, p. 55). Moreover, it is expected that about three times more

people will suffer from heart failure in a few decades, according to Mills et al. (2015). Further

research on gratitude and its positive influences on physical well-being will prepare us for the

upcoming generation when many people will suffer from more health issues.

Opposing Views

We see that gratitude has remarkable influences on one’s mental, social, and physical

well-being. However, some studies show that physical influences might not be as specific as

mental and social influences. Some study results claim that there was no clear effect on physical

outcomes (Boggiss et al., 2020, p. 2) while others see obvious effects (Millstein et al., 2016, p. 5).

Why is the data mixed and how should we treat the confronting data?

Boggiss et al. (2020) pointed out three reasons why the studies concerning gratitude

intervention can be easily biased (p. 7). First, researchers may over-represent their data because of

publication bias. Studies that have stronger impressions and results are more likely to be published

and draw attention than the ones with weaker results. Second, it is impossible to conduct a blind

study when measuring the outcomes of gratitude interventions. Because participants are aware of
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 12

what they participate in, they might give answers that are more preferable for the study,

consciously or unconsciously. That kind of bias is inevitable for this research because we ask

patients to be specific about gratitude interventions. Furthermore, each person perceives their

emotion and physical well-being in different ways and levels. Some may report a difference but

others may not for the same variance. Lastly, there is an additional risk of bias by the use of

subjective measures: participants may report their response with errors. For example, when

researching sleep quality, a participant may underestimate/ overestimate their sleep time. The

article mentioned that older people are more likely to present data with a lack of accuracy.

When we look at any information, it is important to recognize the possible biases in it. An

updated review by Boggiss et al. (2020) selected 19 articles regarding gratitude and examined how

biased they are (p. 2). They used a tool called priori algorithm to see if the data from each article

is accurate and reliable. They sorted out studies mainly into two groups: biased studies and less

biased studies. Then, they collected the results of similar topis only from less biased studies.

According to their review, 5 out of 8 studies that have minimum biases reported that gratitude can

enhance the quality of sleep. 1 out of 1 reliable research with minimum biases reported that

gratitude can improve “blood pressure, glycemic control, asthma control and eating behavior”

(Boggiss et al., 2020, p. 1). However, concerning other categories such as inflammation markers

and self-reported physical symptoms, the results were mixed.

 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 13

Researchers can pay special attention to minimize the bias by using a means called the

Revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool. It assesses the quality of a method that researchers are about

to use for their study. It looks for five possible biases that can be hidden in a study: “(1)

randomization, (2) deviations from the intended interventions (effect of assignment to

intervention), (3) missing outcome data, (4) the measurement of the outcome, and (5) the selection

of the reported result. Researchers also conduct the same study separately to conduct the

assessment to reduce bias” (Boggiss et al., 2020, p. 3). More non-biased studies will help us to be

fully confident of the positive impacts of gratitude on human well-being.

Despite these points, Boggiss et al. (2020) identified that there is sufficient evidence to

conclude that gratitude improves one’s well-being (p. 9). There are many studies that show a

positive correlation between gratitude and better sleep quality. Now, we need to note that better

sleep quality causes better physical and mental functions in various ways. Thus, it is too early to

decide that gratitude does not have much influence on one’s well-being. Rather, there is a greater

chance that gratitude does bring one’s well-being. Further research will help us to know more

details.

Conclusion

Gratitude enhances one’s mental, social, and physical well-being. If we do not understand

the positive influences of gratitude, we could miss many benefits and opportunities as individuals
 Does Gratitude Enhance One’s Well-being? 14

and societies. Lastly, this field has been getting more and more attention from many researchers.

Wood et al. (2010) once stated that “it is the sign of a developing field when research attention

turns from establishing an effect, to showing why that effect occurs, and gratitude research appears

to be in that position” (p.13). Gratitude interventions can be easily conducted at any time and

anywhere at a low cost.

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