This post is a continuation of an earlier post on how a gratitude helped me deal with family traumas.
Gratitude 101
According to Dr. Emmons, one of the leading gratitude researchers, gratitude results from “a two-step cognitive process: (a) recognizing that one has obtained a positive outcome, and (b) recognizing that there is an external source for this positive outcome.” (1)
Gratitude is an emotion we feel and a character trait that can be cultivated to reap its benefits.
Scientific studies use two approaches to test the effect of a gratitude practice: counting one’s blessings, where people are asked to record 3 to 5 good things that happened to them during the day or past week, or writing a gratitude letter to someone towards who they feel gratitude and reading this gratitude letter to this person.
Gratitude increases well-being
In Emmons’ 2003 landmark study on gratitude, 157 undergraduate students were assigned to 3 different groups and asked to journal for 13 days about their blessings (gratitude group), the hassles, or significant events of their life (the control group) (1). The students from the gratitude group experienced higher levels of positive emotions during the 13 days. These students were also more likely to report having helped someone with a personal problem or offered emotional support to another.
Watkins et al. used a randomized control trial to compare during one week a gratitude practice (recounting three blessings and writing how the experience made the subjects grateful), a pride practice (recounting three blessings and writing how the experience made the subjects proud of themselves), and a placebo control (recounting memories and writing about them) (2). The study showed that a gratitude practice increased well-being during the one-week study period and up to 5 weeks post-study (when the last study measurement was taken), probably because it trains people to notice the positive in their lives.
In another landmark study, Seligman et al. designed a randomized control trial comparing 5 happiness exercises and one placebo over one week with a 6-month follow-up and tracked happiness and depression (3). The 5 exercises were one gratitude exercise (writing about three blessings), two exercises to increase subjects’ awareness of what was most positive about themselves, and two exercises for subjects to identify strengths of characters. The placebo control asked subjects to journal about early memories. The gratitude and using signature strengths exercises increased happiness and decreased depression symptoms during the one-week study period and up to 6 months after the study, with the gratitude exercises resulting in the largest mental health benefits.
Gratitude helps people cope better
In a 5-week randomized control trial, Heckendorf et al. compared the effect of a gratitude intervention against a waitlist control group on Repetitive Negative Thinking (RNT) for people with elevated RNT (4). People who practiced the gratitude intervention reported significantly less RNT one week, 3 months, and up to 6 months post-intervention (last measurement). The authors concluded that gratitude trains the mind to disengage from RNT, focus and appreciate the positive in life, and that a gratitude intervention reduces anxiety and depression by reducing the risks of RNT.
Lambert et al. conducted 8 studies to determine how gratitude helps reduce depression risks and symptoms (5). They showed that gratitude prompts people to reframe potentially negative experiences into positive ones, experience more positive emotions, and consequently reduces the pain of negative emotions and depression symptoms. Gratitude is not forcing oneself to see everything positively but training the mind to find the positive in experiences.
Wood et al. studied the relationship between gratitude, coping styles, stress, depression, and well-being (6). They observed that gratitude correlates positively with positive coping mechanisms like seeking both emotional and instrumental social support, positive reinterpretation and growth, active coping, and planning, that gratitude correlates negatively with negative coping styles like behavioral disengagement, self–blame, substance use, and denial, and that coping styles mediated up to 51% of the relationship between gratitude and stress.
Gratitude to thwart depression and suicide risks
Kleiman et al. studied the relationship between gratitude, grit, and suicidal ideation for 209 college students (7). They observed that subjects experiencing high levels of gratitude and grit experienced the highest reduction in suicidal ideation over time, that gratitude was the most important factor in reducing suicidal ideation, and that gratitude confers resiliency to suicide by increasing meaning in life.
Iodice et al. conducted a meta-analysis of 62 published and unpublished articles on the relationship between gratitude and depression, involving 26,427 child, adolescent, and adult participants (8). Their analysis showed that individuals who experience more gratitude have lower levels of depression and that results did not vary significantly with the participants’ age.
Huffman et al. studied the feasibility, acceptability, and effect on optimism and hopelessness of 9 positive psychology exercises for patients hospitalized for suicidal thoughts (9). The 9 exercises were (1) writing a gratitude letter, (2) use of personal strengths, (3) three acts of kindness, (4) important, enjoyable, and meaningful activities, (5) gratitude exercise with recalling three blessings, (6) imagining and writing about their best possible social relationships, or (7) best possible self-accomplishments, (8) forgiveness letter, and (9) behavioral commitment to values-based activities. The authors observed that the gratitude letter, counting one’s blessings, and personal strengths exercises had the highest efficacy and that gratitude journaling was ranked as one of the two easiest interventions to complete.
Gratitude benefits the body too
Wood et al. studied the relationship between gratitude and sleep with a large group of people (401 subjects), with 40% scoring above 5 on the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, indicating clinically impaired sleep (10). They observed that gratitude predicted greater subjective sleep quality and duration, less sleep latency, and daytime dysfunction. They also showed that the positive effect of gratitude on sleep is due to more positive pre-sleep cognitions and less negative pre-sleep cognitions. In other words, gratitude helps people unwind, calm their minds, and focus on the positive, positively affecting sleep quality and duration.
Jackowska et al. studied the effect of a 2-week intervention comparing a gratitude exercise (journaling about one’s blessings), active control (everyday events reporting), and no treatment for 119 young women who reported emotional distress and moderate sleep disturbance (11). They observed that the gratitude exercise increased well-being, optimism, sleep quality, and decreased diastolic blood pressure.
So… what are you waiting for to include a short gratitude practice in your life, if you haven’t already done so?
References
1. Emmons RA, McCullough ME, Counting blessings versus burdens: an experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003, Feb; 84(2), 377-89
2. Watkins PC, Uhder J, Pichinevskiy S, Grateful recounting enhances subjective well-being: The importance of grateful processing, The Journal of Positive Psychology, 2015, 10(2), 91–98
3. Seligman MEP, Steen TA, Park N, Peterson C, Positive psychology progress: Empirical validation of interventions, American Psychologist, 2005, 60, 410–421
4. Heckendorf H, Lehr D, Ebert DD, Freund H, Efficacy of an internet and app-based gratitude intervention in reducing repetitive negative thinking and mechanisms of change in the intervention's effect on anxiety and depression: Results from a randomized controlled trial, Behaviour Research and Therapy, 2019, 119, 103415
5. Lambert NM, Fincham FD, Stillman TF, Gratitude and depressive symptoms: The role of positive reframing and positive emotion. Cognition & Emotion, 2012, 26(4), 615–633
6. Wood AM, Joseph S, Linley PA, Coping style as a psychological resource of grateful people, Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 2007, 26(9), 1076–1093
7. Kleiman EM, Adams LM, Kashdan TB, Riskind JH, Gratitude and grit indirectly reduce risk of suicidal ideations by enhancing meaning in life: Evidence for a mediated moderation model, Journal of Research in Personality, 2013, 47, 539–546
8. Iodice JA, Malouff JM, Schutte NS, The Association between gratitude and depression: a meta-analysis, International Journal of Depression and Anxiety, 2021, 4:024
9. Huffman JC, DuBois CM, Healy BC, Boehm JK, Kashdan TB, Celano CM, Denninger JW, Lyubomirsky S, Feasibility and utility of positive psychology exercises for suicidal inpatients, General Hospital Psychiatry, 2014, 36(1), 88–94
10. Wood AM, Joseph S, Lloyd J, Atkins S, Gratitude influences sleep through the mechanism of pre-sleep cognitions, Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 2009, 66, 43–48
11. Jackowska M, Brown J, Ronaldson A, Steptoe A, The impact of a brief gratitude intervention on subjective well-being, biology and sleep, Journal of Health Psychology, 2016, 10, 2207-17