Gratitude and Indebtedness When Receiving Help
Abstract
The aim of the study was to show the relationship between the emotion of gratitude and the sense of debt and other emotions, as well as the relationship between the emotion of gratitude and debt and dispositional gratitude. The purpose of the study was also to show whether gratitude correlates with a sense of debt and whether it is related to other emotions to a different extent. The aim of the study was also to determine to whom the respondents are grateful and to whom they most often feel indebted. In the study, there were included 148 students of nursing, emergency medical services and pedagogy (100 women, 48 men). The GQ-6 tool of Michael E. McCullough and Robert Emmons’ dispositional gratitude was used, in the Polish adaptation of Marlena Kossakowska and Piotr Kwiatek, the own scale of the intensity of emotions and experimental manipulation aimed at arousing the emotions of gratitude or indebtedness. Gratitude was positively related to joy more strongly in women. Only in women was indebtedness associated with joy and guilt. In the condition of gratitude, gratitude was not associated with a sense of debt, while in the condition of indebtedness, indebtedness was positively related to gratitude. In both conditions, the respondents more often felt the emotion of gratitude than indebtedness. In condition of gratitude, the respondents felt significantly more gratitude than negative emotions. In the condition of indebtedness, the respondents felt more debt than other negative emotions. The respondents more often felt gratitude towards their loved ones, and more often they felt gratitude than debt.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDF (Język Polski)References
Algoe, S.B., Gable, S.L., Maisel, N.C. (2010). It’s the little things: Everyday gratitude as a booster shot for romantic relationships. Personal Relationships, 17(2), 217–233. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-6811.2010.01273.x
Bartlett, L., DeSteno, D. (2006). Gratitude and prosocial behavior: Helping when it costs you. Psychological Science, 17(4), 319–325. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2006.01705.x
Fredrickson, B.L. (1998). What good are positive emotions? Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 300–319. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.2.3.300
Fredrickson, B.L. (2004). Gratitude, like other positive emotions, broadens and builds. W: R.A. Emmons, M.E. McCullough (eds.), The Psychology of Gratitude (s. 145–166). New York: Oxford University Press.
Gouldner, A.W. (1960). The norm of reciprocity: A preliminary statement. American Sociological Review, 25(2), 161–178. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/2092623
Greenberg, M.S. (1980). A theory of indebtedness. W: K.S. Gergen, M.S. Greenberg, R.H. Willis (eds.), Social Exchange: Advances in Theory and Research (s. 3–26). New York: Plenum Press.
Kossakowska, M., Kwiatek, P. (2013). Polska adaptacja kwestionariusza do badania wdzięczności GQ-6. Przegląd Psychologiczny, 56(3–4), 503–514.
Lambert, N.M., Graham, S.M., Fincham, F.D. (2009). A Prototype Analysis of Gratitude: Varieties of Gratitude Experiences. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 35(9), 1193–207. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167209338071
Mathews, M.A., Green, J.D. (2010). Looking at me, appreciating you: Self-focused attention distinguishes between gratitude and indebtedness. Cognition and Emotion, 24(4), 710–718. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02699930802650796
McCullough, M.C., Emmons, R.A., Tsang, J.-A. (2002). The Grateful Disposition: A Conceptual and Empirical Topography. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82(1), 112–127. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.82.1.112
McCullough, M.E., Tsang, J.-A., Emmons, R.A. (2004). Gratitude in Intermediate Affective Terrain: Links of Grateful Moods to Individual Differences and Daily Emotional Experience. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86(2), 295–309. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.86.2.295
Molm, L.D. (2010). The structure of reciprocity. Social Psychology Quarterly, 73(2), 119–131. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0190272510369079
Moors, A. (2014). Flavors of appraisal theories of emotion. Emotion Review, 6(4), 303–307. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073914534477
Oishi, S., Koo, M., Lim, N., Suh, E.M. (2019). When Gratitude Evokes Indebtedness. Applied Psychology. Health and Well-Being, 11(2), 286–303. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/aphw.12155
Peng, C., Nelissen, R.M.A., Zeelenberg, M. (2018). Reconsidering the roles of gratitude and indebtedness in social exchange. Cognition and Emotion, 32(4), 760–772. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2017.1353484
Peng, C., Malafosse, C., Nelissen, R.M.A., Zeelenberg, M. (2020). Gratitude, indebtedness, and reciprocity: An extended replication of Bartlett & DeSteno (2006). Social Influence, 15(1), 4–16. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/15534510.2019.1710248
Steindl-Rast, D. (2004). Gratitude as Thankfulness and Gratefulness. W: R.A. Emmons, M.E. McCullough (eds.), The Psychology of Gratitude (s. 282–289). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tesser, A., Gatewood, R., Driver, M. (1968). Some Determinants of Gratitude. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 9(3), 233–236. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/h0025905
Ting, S.-C. (2017). The Difference between Gratitude and Indebtedness. American International Journal of Contemporary Research, 7(4), 55–62.
Tsang, J.A. (2006). The effects of helper intention on gratitude and indebtedness. Motivation and Emotion, 30(3), 198–204. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-006-9031-z
Watkins, P., Scheer, J., Ovnicek, M., Kolts, R. (2006). The debt of gratitude: Dissociating gratitude and indebtedness. Cognition and Emotion, 20(2), 217–241. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02699930500172291
Wolanin, A. (2019). Przegląd koncepcji wdzięczności w psychologii. Polskie Forum Psychologiczne, 24(3), 356–372. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14656/PFP20190306
Wood, A.M., Maltby, J., Steward, N., Linley, P.A., Joseph, S. (2008). A social-cognitive model of trait and state levels of gratitude. Emotion, 8(2), 281–290. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/1528-3542.8.2.281
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17951/j.2021.34.3.147-162
Date of publication: 2021-12-23 22:21:15
Date of submission: 2021-03-01 14:06:32
Statistics
Indicators
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
Copyright (c) 2021 Agata Wolanin, Jan Rybak
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.