When I was nine years old, I came down with a serious case of encephalitis. I spent a couple of weeks drifting in and out of sleep, hooked up to tubes and IVs, unable to talk—and then I slipped into a coma. A doctor warned my mom and dad that I might not come out “normal” or be able to walk again. When I came through a week later, I was happy to see my parents and my aunt standing in front of me, masks covering their mouths, their eyes open with relief and trembling with concern. I figured something was wrong, but didn’t understand what.
“I want pizza,” I uttered.
I had to wait a week before I could eat regular food. But my parents and relatives talked with me about the things I could do when I got out, which helped me to set my sights on getting better. And the many prayers from loved ones mattered; I believed them. When one nurse, named Flo, asked me about my hobbies and interests, it made me feel special and it focused me on things I wanted to do again. She was surprised to learn that I had never had a shake. As soon as I could eat regular food again, Flo showed up with a chocolate shake for me! I was filled with gratitude.
Knowing that people were there for me and believed in me guided my focus and gave me strength. It was the highlight of each day when my parents arrived with a treat or homemade food. I believed their encouragement that I was strong and would get out soon. I surprised the doctor with my recovery by the end of the week and, after leaving the hospital, with my progress through physical therapy.
My lifelong interest in the positive power of relationships started with this negative life event. Twenty-three years later, I began scientifically exploring gratitude in postdoctoral work with Michael McCullough at the University of Miami. Though I started out studying forgiveness, I was surprised to learn that there was virtually no research on the development of gratitude. I had found my niche!
As an immigrant who had always gravitated towards adults who personally cared about my development, gratitude seemed particularly valuable to me and to the topic of supporting youth achievement. In 2007, Michael Furlong at UC Santa Barbara invited me to write a chapter on the potential of gratitude in school. Research on gratitude in youth was just emerging, mainly being done by a psychologist at Hofstra University by the name of Jeffrey Froh. Jeff and I wrote two chapters about gratitude, and as we embarked on more research together, we sought a grant to support our work. In 2011, thanks to funding from the John Templeton Foundation, the Youth Gratitude Project (YGP) was born. We’re working with hundreds of students and educators to understand how to measure and cultivate gratitude in schools and at home.
Today, I’m often asked, “What’s the secret to instilling gratitude in kids?” This question is tough to answer in a few sentences because gratitude is a complex social behavior that we must personalize and work at regularly to grow (just like nutritional or exercise habits that last). It will emerge spontaneously, in situations like the one I faced. But can we cultivate gratitude and its benefits in our daily lives? The truth is that the science of gratitude is just starting out—and there’s a lot we still don’t know. Here’s an overview of what we’ve discovered about kids and thankfulness, and the questions we’re still trying to answer.
Figuring out what happens when kids say “thanks”
To start, we tried to figure out how to measure gratitude in children and teens. Research had yet to verify if existing measures of gratitude were suitable for assessing gratitude in 10-19 year olds. We examined this in a study six years ago, and our main findings were that the standard for measuring the grateful personality in adults, the GQ-6, did not perform well for 10-13 year olds but was sufficient for 14-19 year olds.
We recommended that better measures needed to be developed for children younger than 13. We are now examining if modified versions of the GQ-6 that use more age-appropriate wording or formatting perform with greater consistency and accuracy for 7-19 year olds. We also need a measure for preschoolers, and we’re currently conducting assessment studies with that group. Lack of such measures hinders basic and applied research on gratitude in youth.
The YGP also addressed the effects of gratitude on children and teens. An early study of 14-19 year olds linked gratitude to outcomes like better GPA, less envy and depression, and more life satisfaction and flow. We also found that materialism tended to negatively affect these outcomes.
We’re examining these and other relationships longitudinally—meaning that we’re following how they unfold over time—and findings so far show that gratitude is related to more prosocial behavior, satisfaction with life, hope, and search for purpose, and less antisocial behavior and depression over a period of four years. One study we just submitted for publication shows that gratitude and prosocial behavior reinforce each other—and that adolescents who show more gratitude are more likely to be skilled at identifying goals and strategizing ways to reach them, and they tend to be more empathic and trusting. These findings suggest that gratitude helps youth develop their competencies and become their own person by gradually improving themselves and how they interact with others.
Finally, another study of ours found that 8-11 year old students could be taught to think gratefully (i.e., be better at appraising gifts they receive from benefactors) in school and that doing so supports their emotional well-being over a period of five months. It also, unsurprisingly, leads them to express thanks more, compared to students who were not taught grateful thinking. We are also examining the effects of a gratitude and purpose curriculum on students in grades 4-12.
So far, so good. So, what’s next?
No comments:
Post a Comment