Gratitude Promotes Unconscious Goal Pursuit:the Mediating Role Of The Goal Accessibility

Gratitude is the positive emotional experience when individuals receive the help or gifts from others,which can promote the physical and mental development of individuals.Unconscious goal pursuit is a process in which individuals automatically pursue goals activated by situational cues,which can ensure that individuals can survive well in the social environment.Positive emotion is an important factor of influencing the pursuit of unconscious goals.As a representative positive emotion,gratitude can improve individuals’ sensitivity to the experience of others in society,and enhance the degree to which goal representation is activated in the individuals’ mind,that is the goal accessibility.At the same time,gratitude can also expand their cognitive thinking to irrelevant situations.The purpose of this study is to explore the role of gratitude in promoting the pursuit of unconscious goals,and to further explore the internal ways in which gratitude affects the pursuit of unconscious goals.The study included two experiments: experiment 1 explored the promoting effect of gratitude on the pursuit of unconscious goals(the cooperation goal and the competition goal)by exploring the influence of different emotional priming(gratitude vs.neutral)and different goal priming(cooperation vs.competition vs.no priming)on the pursuit of unconscious goals.On the basis of experiment 1,experiment 2 further discussed the promotion effect of gratitude on the pursuit of unconscious goals under the launch of another goal(the money-making goal),and the ways in which gratitude affects the pursuit of unconscious goals,namely whether gratitude can promote the pursuit of unconscious goals by increasing the accessibility of goals.Experiment 1 recruited 193 undergraduates from Henan University and adopted a 2×3 inter-group experimental design.The independent variables were emotional priming(gratitude vs.neutral)and goal priming(competition vs.cooperation vs.no priming).The dependent variable is the cooperation level of the subjects in the public goods dilemma task(the level of investment).The higher the investment,the higher the cooperation level of the subjects.The higher investment means the greater degree of the subjects’ pursuit of the goal of cooperation.The less investment means the greater degree of the subjects’ pursuit of the goal of competition.The results of the study are as following:(1)The main effect of emotional priming was significant,and the cooperation level of the gratitude group was significantly higher than that of the neutral group.(2)The main effect of goal priming was significant.The cooperation level of the cooperative goal priming group was significantly higher than that of the non-goal priming group and the competitive goal priming group.(3)The interaction between emotional priming and goal priming was significant.And the interaction between emotional priming and goal priming was still significant after controlling for general positive emotions.Under the cooperative goal priming,the cooperation level of the gratitude group was significantly higher than that of the neutral group.Under the competition goal priming,the cooperation level of the gratitude group was significantly lower than that of the neutral group.There was no significant difference in cooperation level between the gratitude group and the neutral group under the non-goal priming.Experiment 2 recruited 130 undergraduate students from Henan University and adopted a 2×2 inter-group experimental design.The independent variables were emotional priming(gratitude vs.neutral)and goal priming(money-making vs.no priming).The dependent variable is the goal pursuit behavior(the time spent by the subjects in the picture appreciation task).The less time means the more the subjects want to strive for a future opportunity to earn money,and means the greater degree of the subjects’ pursuit of the goal of making money.The mediation variable is the goal accessibility index.The results of the study are as following:(4)The main effect of emotional priming was significant,and the goal pursuit behavior of the gratitude group was significantly higher than that of the neutral group.(5)The main effect of goal priming was significant.The goal pursuit behavior of the subjects in the money-making goal priming group was significantly higher than that of the non-goal priming group.(6)The interaction between emotional priming and goal priming was significant.Under the money-making goal priming,the goal pursuit behavior of the gratitude group was significantly higher than that of the neutral group,which showed that the appreciation time of the pictures of the gratitude group was significantly lower than that of the neutral group.Under the condition of non-goal priming,there was no significant difference between the goal pursuit behavior of the gratitude group and the neutral group.(7)Under the money-making goal priming,the goal accessibility index had significant mediating effect between emotional priming and goal pursuit behavior,and the goal accessibility index played a partial mediating role between emotional priming and goal pursuit behavior.