Iranian Journal of Health Psychology

In collaboration with Payame Noor University and Iranian Health Psychology

Current Issue

By Issue

By Author

By Subject

Author Index

Keyword Index

About Journal

Aims and Scope

Editorial Board

Journal Metrics

Publication Ethics

Indexing and Abstracting

Related Links

FAQ

Peer Review Process

News

A Study on the Effect of Gratitude on Happiness and Well Being

Document Type : research

Authors

1 PhD of Psychology, Department of Psychology, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran

2 Department of Psychology, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University

3 PhD of Psychology, Department of Psychology, Tehran Centeral Branch, Islamic Azad University

Abstract

Background: Gratitude is a general state of thankfulness and appreciation. The majority of empirical studies indicate that there is an association between gratitude and a sense of overall well being..Currently, mental health is especially important in some occupations with harsh work conditions which require strong personal and mental capacities. Psychological well-being and happiness is especially important in personnel working in the healthcare sector. This study aimed to assess whether gratitude training affects psychological well-being and happiness in hospital personnel. Method: In this semi-experimental study with pre-test and post-test, 72 personnel working in 5 hospitals affiliated to Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran, participated. The participants were randomly divided into intervention and control groups using block randomization. Then, the participants in the intervention group were given 10 group sessions of 90 minutes gratitude training. Ryff’s Scale of Psychological Well Being, Subjective Happiness Scale, Gratitude Questionnaire-6, and a Gratitude training package were used for data collection. Results: The results show that there is no significant difference in the mean scores of psychological well-being, domains of psychological well-being, and happiness between the two groups at baseline, and gratitude training significantly affected all domains of psychological well-being (except for autonomy) and happiness. Conclusion: This study demonstrates that Gratitude training is effective in enhancing psychological well-being and Happiness.

Keywords

Article Title [Persian]

مطالعه تأثیر قدردانی در شادی و خوشبختی

Authors [Persian]

  • ساره بهزادى پور 1
  • علیرضا صادقی 2
  • مژگان سپاه منصور 3

2 دانشگاه آزاد اسلامی واحد شیراز

Abstract [Persian]

Background: Gratitude is a general state of thankfulness and appreciation. The majority of empirical studies indicate that there is an association between gratitude and a sense of overall well being..Currently, mental health is especially important in some occupations with harsh work conditions which require strong personal and mental capacities. Psychological well-being and happiness is especially important in personnel working in the healthcare sector. This study aimed to assess whether gratitude training affects psychological well-being and happiness in hospital personnel. Method: In this semi-experimental study with pre-test and post-test, 72 personnel working in 5 hospitals affiliated to Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran, participated. The participants were randomly divided into intervention and control groups using block randomization. Then, the participants in the intervention group were given 10 group sessions of 90 minutes gratitude training. Ryff’s Scale of Psychological Well Being, Subjective Happiness Scale, Gratitude Questionnaire-6, and a Gratitude training package were used for data collection. Results: The results show that there is no significant difference in the mean scores of psychological well-being, domains of psychological well-being, and happiness between the two groups at baseline, and gratitude training significantly affected all domains of psychological well-being (except for autonomy) and happiness. Conclusion: This study demonstrates that Gratitude training is effective in enhancing psychological well-being and Happiness.

Keywords [Persian]

  • Gratitude
  • psychological well-being
  • happiness
  • psychological Intervention
  • positive psychology
References
Argyle, M., Martin, M., & Lu, L. (1995). Testing for stress and happiness: The role of social and cognitive factors. Stress and emotion, 15, 173-187. Bloodworth, A., McNamee, M., 2007. Conceptions of well-being in psychology and exercise psychology research: a philosophical critique. Health Care Anal. 15 (2), 107–121. Cavendish, R., Konecny, L., Mitzeliotis, C., Russo, D., Luise, B. K., Medeíindt, J., & Bajo, M. A. M. (2003). Spiritual care activities of nurses using nursing interventions classification (NIC) labels. International Journal of Nursing Terminologies and Classifications, 14(4), 113-124. Cohn, M., Fredrickson, B., Brown, S., Mikels, J., Conway, A., 2009. Happiness unpacked: positive emotions increase life satisfaction by building resilience. Emotion 9 (3), 361–368, http://dx.doi. org/10.1037/a0015952 Diener, E., & Chan, M. Y. (2011). Happy people live longer: Subjective well‐being contributes to health and longevity. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 3(1), 1-43. Diener, E., Oishi, S., & Lucas, R. E. (2003). Personality, culture, and subjective well-being: Emotional and cognitive evaluations of life. Annual review of psychology, 54(1), 403-425. Emmons, R. A. (2007). Thanks!: How the new science of gratitude can make you happier: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Emmons, R. A. (2012). Queen of the virtues? Gratitude as human strength. Reflective practice: Formation and supervision in ministry, 32. Emmons, R. A., & Crumpler, C. A. (2000). Gratitude as a human strength: Appraising the evidence. Journal of social and Clinical Psychology, 19(1), 56-69. Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: an experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. Journal of personality and social psychology, 84(2), 377. Fowler, J., Christakis, N., 2008. Dynamic spread of happiness in a large social network: longitudinal analysis over 20 years in the Framingham Heart Study. Br. Med. J. Res., http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/ bmj.a2338. Froh, J. J., Sefick, W. J., & Emmons, R. A. (2008). Counting blessings in early adolescents: An experimental study of gratitude and subjective wellbeing. Journal of School Psychology, 46(2), 213- 233. Hill, P. L., Allemand, M., & Roberts, B. W. (2013). Examining the pathways between gratitude and selfrated physical health across adulthood. Personality and individual differences, 54(1), 92-96. Honkanen, H., Jaakko Kaprio, J., Honkanen, R., Viinama¨ki, H., Koskenvuo, M., 2005. The Stability of life satisfaction in a 15-year follow-up of adult Finns healthy at baseline. BioMed Cent. Psychiatry 5 (4.) Kendler, K. S., Liu, X.-Q., Gardner, C. O., McCullough, M. E., Larson, D., & Prescott, C. A. (2003). Dimensions of religiosity and their relationship to lifetime psychiatric and substance use disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(3), 496-503. Keyes, C. L., & Grzywacz, J. G. (2005). Health as a complete state: The added value in work performance and healthcare costs. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 47(5), 523-532. Krawczynski, M., & Olszewski, H. (2000). Psychological well-being associated with a physical activity programme for persons over 60 years old. Psychology of sport and exercise, 1(1), 57-63. Lee Duckworth, A., Steen, T. A., & Seligman, M. E. (2005). Positive psychology in clinical practice. Annu. Rev. Clin. Psychol., 1, 629-651. Lucas, R. E., & Diener, E. (2008). Subjective wellbeing. Handbook of emotions, 471-484. Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). The how of happiness: A scientific approach to getting the life you want: Penguin. Lyubomirsky, S., & Lepper, H. S. (1999). A measure of subjective happiness: Preliminary reliability and construct validation. Social Indicators Research, 46(2), 137-155. Ma, M., Kibler, J. L., & Sly, K. (2013). Gratitude is associated with greater levels of protective factors and lower levels of risks in African American adolescents. Journal of adolescence, 36(5), 983- 991. McCullough, M. E., Emmons, R. A., & Tsang, J.-A. (2002). The grateful disposition: a conceptual and empirical topography. Journal of personality and social psychology, 82(1), 112. Mojs, E., Stanislawska-Kubiak, M., Skommer, M., Wojciak, R., 2009. Smoking from the perspective of positive psychology. Przegl. Lek. 66 (10), 765–767 Nel, L. (2011). The Psychofortological Experiences Of Master’s Degree Students In Professional Psychology Programmes: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Citeseer. Oishi, S., & Gilbert, E. A. (2016). Current and future directions in culture and happiness research. Current Opinion in Psychology, 8, 54-58. Park, N., Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. E. (2004). Strengths of character and well-being. Journal of social and Clinical Psychology, 23(5), 603-619. Ryff, C. D. (1995). Psychological well-being in adult life. Current directions in psychological science, 4(4), 99-104. Ryff, C. D., & Singer, B. (1998). The contours of positive human health. Psychological inquiry, 9(1), 1-28. Seligman, M. E., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2014). Positive psychology: An introduction Flow and the Foundations of Positive Psychology (pp. 279-298): Springer. Seligman, M. E., Steen, T. A., Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2005). Positive psychology progress: empirical validation of interventions. American Psychologist, 60(5), 410. Sheldon, K. M., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2006). How to increase and sustain positive emotion: The effects of expressing gratitude and visualizing best possible selves. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 1(2), 73-82. Stephan, Y., Caudroit, J., & Chalabaev, A. (2011). Subjective health and memory self-efficacy as mediators in the relation between subjective age and life satisfaction among older adults. Aging & mental health, 15(4), 428-436. Stubbe, J., de Moor, M., Boomsma, D.I., de Geus, E.J.C., 2007. The association between exercise participation and well-being: a co-twin study. Prev. Med. 44 (2), 148– 152 Tulbure, B. T. (2015). Appreciating the positive protects us from negative emotions: The relationship between gratitude, depression and religiosity. ProcediaSocial and Behavioral Sciences, 187, 475-480. Veenhoven, R. (2009). How do we assess how happy we are? Tenets, implications and tenability of three theories. Happiness, economics and politics, 45-69. Weiner, B. (1985). An attributional theory of achievement motivation and emotion. Psychological review, 92(4), 548. Wood, A. M., Froh, J. J., & Geraghty, A. W. (2010). Gratitude and well-being: A review and theoretical integration. Clinical psychology review, 30(7), 890- 905. Wood, A. M., & Joseph, S. (2010). The absence of positive psychological (eudemonic) well-being as a risk factor for depression: A ten year cohort study. Journal of affective disorders, 122(3), 213-217. Wood, A. M., Joseph, S., & Maltby, J. (2008). Gratitude uniquely predicts satisfaction with life: Incremental validity above the domains and facets of the five factor model. Personality and individual differences, 45(1), 49-54.
Iranian Journal of Health Psychology
Volume 1, Issue 2 - Serial Number 2
Serial No. 2
December 2018
Pages 65-72
Files
Share
How to cite
Statistics