Ecological Momentary Gratitude Intervention Produces Immediate Mood Effects Sarah Ringenberg & Emily Ragsdale Indiana Wesleyan University

Background Practicing gratitude has led to higher levels of positive affect (Emmons & McCullough, 2003) Seligman studied long-term effects of gratitude intervention (Seligman & Steen, 2005) Three good things Gratitude visit You at your best Using signature strengths in a new way Identifying signature strengths

Background (cont.) Listing three good things and using signature strengths in a new way Increased happiness/decreased depressive symptoms for six months Gratitude visit Caused large positive changes for one month Control and other two conditions produced positive, but short-term effects (Seligman & Steen, 2005)

Background (cont.) Literature suggests a strong, unique, and causal relationship between gratitude and well-being (Wood et al., 2010) Gratitude can have a “healing effect,” making it useful as a psychotherapeutic intervention (Emmons & Stern, 2013)

Difference in this Study Past studies have simply evaluated effects of gratitude by using retrospective recall Participants think back to how they felt rather than respond at the time the feeling is taking place We examine the momentary effect of gratitude intervention Practice of three good things Implemented through the use of an app

Ecological Momentary Assessment & Intervention iHabit™

iHabit ™ EMA/EMI App App is designed to collect data in the moment More accurate in gathering data Offers a number of question formats Free response, Likert scale, Slider response Provides various intervention techniques Quotes, prompts, encouragement, etc. Potential intervention tool to create behavior change Increases participant awareness

Research Question How does practicing gratitude affect happiness in the moment?

Method

Participants Traditional undergraduate students from Indiana Wesleyan University (N=152) Chance to increase happiness iPhone necessary for participation Monetary compensation ($25.00) Randomly assigned to one of three conditions

Study Design Pretest 14-Day Full Gratitude Intervention Posttest 1 Month Follow-Up 14-Day Partial Gratitude Intervention Posttest 1 Month Follow-Up 14-Day Control Intervention Posttest 1 Month Follow-Up

Pretest/Posttest Gratitude Resentment and Appreciation Test (Thomas & Watkins, 2003; Diessner & Lewis, 2007) Positive Affect Negative Affect Scale (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988) Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985)

Conditions

Please list 1 or 2 things that happened in the last hour for which you are grateful:

Assessing for Mood Participants could indicate mood level on app after: Daily Prompts End-of-the-day questions Please rate your mood right now.

Results

Analysis of Covariance Higher mood-in-the-moment ratings for gratitude group when controlling for pretest scores on: Total Gratitude score (p=.03) PANAS Positive Affect (p<.001) Satisfaction with life (p=.001)

Mean of Mood Ratings

Analysis of Variance Lower variability of mood scores for the full gratitude group compared to partial gratitude and control

Variability of Mood Ratings

Discussion

Increased mood-in-the-moment ratings The full gratitude group reported higher mood scores in the moment compared to the other two groups Stabilized mood effect Less variability in the full gratitude group

Implications Intentionally reflecting on blessings increases mood in the moment Consistently practicing gratitude can help mood become more consistent and stable Over time, we would suspect that consistently practicing gratitude will result in: Long-term increase and stability of mood (Seligman & Steen, 2005) Other positive psychosocial outcomes (Emmons & Stern, 2013)

Further Research Expanding gratitude intervention to the larger community Offering gratitude intervention for a longer and more varied amount of time Displaying the changes in mood levels on the app

Acknowledgements Tim Steenbergh, PhD Jason Runyan, D.Phil Doug Daugherty, PsyD

References Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: An experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(2), 377–389. doi: / Emmons, R. A., & Stern, R. (2013). Gratitude as a psychotherapeutic intervention. Journal of clinical psychology, 69(8), 846–55. doi: /jclp Seligman, M., & Steen, T. (2005). Positive psychology press: Empirical validation of interventions. American Psychologist, 60(5), Wood, A. M., Froh, J. J., & Geraghty, A. W. a. (2010). Gratitude and well-being: a review and theoretical integration. Clinical psychology review, 30(7), 890–905. doi: /j.cpr