Gratitude and generosity

Here’s an excerpt from an article that the Washington Post published. This bit didn’t make the final cut, but it’s a pretty interesting study of the connection between gratitude and generosity.

Gratitude and generosity

In gratitude’s attempts to steer us toward well-being, it sometimes takes us through uncomfortable places, as shown in a study by Gonzaga University assistant professor of psychology Monica Bartlett and Northeastern University associate professor of psychology David DeSteno. Barlett and DeSteno found that gratitude begets graciousness — even when the pleasure of giving turns to displeasure.

In their 2005 study, the two placed 237 Northeastern University students three at a time in the following soap-opera-like scenario: the researchers give Allison a task to do at a computer, then pull the computer’s plug while she’s not looking. Bobby, a stranger to Allison, comes over to help her. Allison thinks Bobby is helping because he’s a nice guy. Nope: Bobby is the researcher’s stooge. Allison completes her task with Bobby’s help. The researchers measure Allison’s gratitude with a questionnaire and she leaves.

In the hallway, Allison meets another stranger, Chandra, who is also a stooge. She asks Allison to fill out a brief survey, but the survey isn’t brief at all; it’s designed to be unpleasant to work on. The researchers measure Allison’s generosity by how many minutes she works on Chandra’s bogus survey. The final step is up to the researchers: looking at what effect Allison’s gratitude for Bobby had on her generosity.

The results? First, 100% of the time that Allison feels grateful, she works at least a minute on Chandra’s survey. She spends an average of 20 minutes helping Chandra when feeling thankful — even though the survey drains her — compared to only 12 minutes when not thankful.

Interpreting Allison’s behavior, DeSteno states that gratitude for Bobby motivates her to stay the extra eight minutes — even though it is a burden for her to do so.

But Allison’s graciousness to Chandra evaporates when the researchers surreptitiously let her discover that her gratitude for Bobby is causing it: her work on Chandra’s survey drops from 20 minutes to only 6.

The drastic drop, suggests DeSteno, is due to overcompensating for the perceived error of helping someone who has not helped you. “They actually kind of overcorrect themselves, saying ‘Well, I’m really not going to be a sucker to my feelings or let them bias my judgment,’” he says.

Speculating on the reason humans have gratitude, DeSteno suggests we may be hard-wired for it as a means of building social bonds. “We think that one of the main purposes of gratitude is to tell us to repay a person who’s helped us. The feeling of gratitude is a pleasant one, but it’s distinct from feeling happy. Our intent with this study was to show that gratitude is what makes you want to help me. And you help me not from just knowing that I helped you, but feeling it.”

Copyright © 2007 Darrin Koltow.