Gratitude And Life Satisfaction Essay

This proposed study will examine the theoretical association between gratitude and

subjective well-being in Pakistani undergraduates. Gratitude has been theorized by many

psychologists as an emotion, an attitude, a moral virtue, a habit, a personality trait, or a coping

response. From the religious viewpoint, it is usually engaged with the God Almighty but

according to Solomon and Teigen (1997) gratitude is the quality of being thankful and to show

thankfulness not only to God but to his creations as well. One of the world’s prominent scientific

experts on gratitude, Robert Emmons (2010), has defined two important components of

gratitude; first is the confirmation of goodness. It means that people confirm that there are good

things

The authors

concluded from their experience that counting blessings significantly seems to be an effective

intervention for enhancing well-being and happiness in adults.

Watkins, Woodward, Stone, & Kolts (2003) found quality gratitude to be negatively

related to hatred about the past, and to depression and positively associated with life satisfaction

(Woodward, Moua, & Watkins, 1998). McCullough, Emmons, and Tsang (2002) also found

gratitude to be negatively associated with depression, anxiety and envy. Moreover, gratitude was

associated positively with optimism and hope. Thankfulness was related to less risk for

suppressing (e.g., depression and anxiety) and expressing disorders (e.g., substance abuse) in a

study involving 2,616 male and female twins (Kendler et al., 2003). These results suggest that

gratitude is unable to get along with negative emotions and unreasonable conditions and that it

may even offer protection against unhealthy conditions.

Taken together, these findings point out that gratitude is an emotion that can help in

securing supportive social relationships. Experiences of gratitude come from admitting