A Research On The Relationship Between Gratitude And Well-being Among The Middle-school Students

Positive Psychology was a scientific study of ordinary human strengths andvirtue.Gratitude, as an important realm of Positive Psychology, was worth of paying closeattention to and doing in-depth study.The close relationship between gratitude and happinesshas been studied in numerous studies, results showing that the higher tendency of one’sgratitude, the higher his living satisfaction will be.Based on these researches, it is fairlyneecessary to conduct some deeper studies of the gratitude.In current paper, total of three studies were employed. Study1sought to explore therelationship between gratitude and well-being (general well-being,positive affect,negativeaffect,and life satisfaction) by using meta-analysis method and also control the moderator tohave inner analysis, indivating that the size-related effects of gratitude and general well-being,positive emotions, negative emotions, life satisfaction were0.41,0.40,-0.21,0.42. In Study2,the variable of basic psychological need was introduced to explore the relationship amonggratitude, basic psychological need and well-being and594middle-school students from twosecondary schools participated the survey. Results found that the mediating effect ofpsychological needs was50.8%between gratitude and happiness of the total effect of therelationship. A longitudinal research method was utilized in Study3in order to observe thedevelopment and changes of gratitude with time passing.188middle-school students tookpart in it which lasted five weeks; additionally, we also sought to construct a vertical structuremodel by evaluating the changes of the basic psychological needs and well-being. The resultsshowed that: thr mediating effect of week psychological needs accounted for13.79percent ofthe total effec of gratitude and well-being peer week.The main conclusions were as follows:(1) Meta-analysis results showed that there were significant moderate positivecorrelations between gratitude and general well-being, as well as positive affect and life satisfaction; likewise, a significant moderate negative correlation was found between gratitudeand negative affect.(2) There exists significant partial correlation among gratitude,basic psychological needand each factor of gratitude.Structural equation model that supportted the the inter-mediaryrole of basic psychological need between gratitude and well-being.(3) There exists mediated effect of Psychological needs between Gratitude and Well-beingamong the middle-school students.