Gratitude is Related to the Identity of the Benefactor

Abstract

In the past, there has been a dearth of research exploring related factors regarding the benefactor in the research of gratitude. The focus of this study is to investigate whether different benefactors elicit different levels of gratitude in beneficiaries after conferring a favor. Using college students as the research subjects, questionnaires were conducted after subjects read the experimental text to explore whether college students’ gratitude is different when two types of benefactors (friends and parents) give the same help. This study found that when the benefactor makes a big effort to confer a favor and the favor is very important to the beneficiary, there is no significant difference in the gratitude toward their parents and friends among college students and the level of gratitude for both is very high. However, when the favor only is conferred through an ordinary amount of effort and the favor is of ordinary importance to the beneficiary, college students have a higher level of gratitude to their friends, but a lower level of gratitude to their parents. Therefore, college students do not necessarily have higher gratitude to their friends than to their parents; the amount of effort exerted by the benefactor and the importance of the favor to the beneficiary are two key factors.