Personality and Individual Differences 53 (2012) 5963

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Personality and Individual Differences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid

Appreciation uniquely predicts life satisfaction above demographics,

the Big 5 personality factors, and gratitude
N.S. Fagley
GSAPP, Rutgers University, 152 Frelinghuysen Rd., Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This research was the rst to examine whether appreciation explains variance in life satisfaction after
Received 22 August 2011 controlling for gender, age, ethnicity, the Big 5 personality factors, and gratitude. Participants (N = 243)
Received in revised form 17 February 2012 completed the Satisfaction with Life Scale, Big 5 Inventory, GQ-6 gratitude measure, and Appreciation
Accepted 22 February 2012
Scale, including subscales measuring have focus, awe, ritual, present moment, self/social comparison,
Available online 19 March 2012
gratitude, loss/adversity, and interpersonal appreciation. Appreciation made a signicant unique contri-
bution (11% of the variance, p < .001) to life satisfaction, controlling for demographic variables, the Big 5
Keywords:
personality factors, and gratitude. This is consistent with the theoretical stance that appreciation is more
Gratitude
Appreciation
than just gratitude or the Big 5 personality factors and is important in its own right for life satisfaction.
Appreciation scale 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Life satisfaction
Big 5
Well-being
SWB
Positive psychology

1. Introduction Adler and Fagley (2005) dened appreciation as acknowledg-

Some people savor good times with friends, are grateful for the
sacrices others make for them, and appreciate positive aspects of
their environment. Yet others fail to notice these things, taking po-
sitive outcomes, experiences, or circumstances for granted. These
latter individuals may focus on negative events, conictual interac-
tions, and discouraging outcomes, and they might simply react
with entitlement to positive events and experiences. As these
observations suggest, there are individual differences in apprecia-
tion, and research has demonstrated these differences are related
to important outcomes such as life satisfaction (LS) and positive af-
fect (e.g., Adler & Fagley, 2005; Tucker, 2007). In this article, the
relation between appreciation and LS is examined more closely.
1.1. Appreciation and life satisfaction
LS is the cognitive component of subjective wellbeing (SWB);
positive and negative affect comprise the affective component. LS
is a conscious appraisal of the quality of ones life (Pavot & Diener,
1993). Adler and Fagley (2005) demonstrated that appreciation
was related to LS and positive affect, even after controlling for opti-
mism, emotional self-awareness, and spirituality.
Tel.: +1 732 745 8771; fax: +1 848 445 4888.
E-mail address: fagley@rci.rutgers.edu
ing the value and meaning of somethingan event, a person, a
behavior, an objectand feeling a positive emotional connection
to it (p. 81; see also Adler, 2002). Therefore appreciation involves
both cognition and affect. Appreciation is viewed as a higher-order
construct having eight aspects (lower-order components), which
contribute to SWB. Each aspect may involve different processes
and/or mechanisms and be related differentially to components
of SWB and other outcomes. Consequently using the framework
of the eight aspects and maintaining these distinctions may facili-
tate developing interventions to increase appreciation, and ulti-
mately SWB, and bring clarity to planning and interpreting
research on fostering SWB. The eight aspects of appreciation can
be remembered by the acronym: HARPS-GLI (see Table 1). Next I
discuss each aspect, to promote understanding possible targets
for interventions and how each may foster SWB.
The rst aspect of appreciation, have focus, is focusing on
what one has rather than lacks. What one has includes material
possessions and also such things as ones health or opportunities.
The awe aspect of appreciation refers to feeling a deep emotional,
spiritual, or transcendental connection to somethinga stunning
vista, a forest of Redwoods, or birth of a baby. The ritual aspect rep-
resents performing acts to foster appreciation. Rituals provide cues
to help people notice and value the good in their lives, counteract-
ing hedonic adaptation in which people habituate to their
circumstances (Brickman, Coates, & Janoff-Bulman, 1978; Sheldon

0191-8869/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.paid.2012.02.019
60 N.S. Fagley / Personality and Individual Differences 53 (2012) 5963
Table 1
The eight aspects of appreciation: HARPS-GLI.
Aspect Brief description and typical item
Have focus Focusing on what one has (rather than lacks) and valuing it.
I count my blessings for what I have in this world.
Awe Feeling awe/wonder, a sense of transcendent connection, to
nature, beauty, or life itself.
When I see natural beauty like Niagara Falls, I feel like a
child who is awestruck.
Ritual Engaging in rituals to foster appreciation.
I perform rituals (i.e., pray or say grace before a meal) that
remind me to be appreciative.a
Present moment Engaging in mindful awareness of the present moment.
I notice things like the rst owers of spring.
Self/social Using self/social comparison to foster appreciation.
comparison I reect on the worst times in my life to help me realize
how fortunate I am now
Gratitude Feeling gratitude to others for help, gifts, or benets.
I acknowledge when people go out of their way for me.
Loss/adversity Using experiences of loss/adversity to foster appreciation.
Thinking about dying reminds me to live every day to the
fullest.
Interpersonal Noticing and valuing the contribution that relationships
make to ones life and well-being, and expressing it.
I let others know how much I appreciate them.
a
The last six words were inadvertently omitted from this item in Table 5 of Adler
and Fagley (2005).
& Lyubormirsky, 2006). Admittedly, there is a tension between
adopting a ritual (an habitual practice) and avoiding rote behav-
ior/taking things for granted. Rituals may be frequent, such as
giving thanks before eating, or less often such as celebrating the
rst snowfall, sacricing for Lent, or annual fasting. Shared rituals
can also foster a sense of connection to others. The present mo-
ment aspect of appreciation is engaging in mindful awareness of
the here and now, ones surroundings and their positive quali-
ties. Awe and present moment appear connected with savoring
(Bryant & Veroff, 2007). The self/social comparison aspect of appre-
ciation is using comparison to others or ones past to promote
appreciating the positive aspects of ones life. For example, I may
appreciate my current job because it is better than my previous
job (self-comparison), or because it is better than my friends job
(social comparison). A large body of theory and research has
addressed when, and to whom, one compares oneself and its
effects (see e.g., Suls & Wheeler, 2000). The gratitude aspect of
appreciation refers to noticing a benet received (gifts, perceived
efforts, sacrices/actions on ones behalf) and feeling grateful to
someone for it. It is a positive emotion directed to a benefactor
for some perceived, intentional benet. The loss/adversity aspect
of appreciation is using ones perceived losses, experiences of
adversity, or close calls to promote appreciating the positive as-
pects of ones life. Janoff-Bulman and Berger (2000) observed that
trauma survivors often experience increased appreciation, likely
due to using the trauma experience as a new reference point which
imbues previously ordinary events, relationships, or conditions
with heightened value. And nally, the eighth aspect, interpersonal
appreciation, is valuing the people in ones life and the contribu-
tion that relationships make to ones life and well-being and
expressing that. This differs from feeling grateful to someone for
a benet or gift. It is being grateful for someone. Focusing attention
on the conceptual framework of appreciation, including clarifying
the relation between gratitude and appreciation, may promote
research on more aspects of appreciation and clarify existing re-
search which has tended to label everything gratitude, regardless
of which aspect was targeted. Furthermore, it may be useful when
developing interventions to inuence LS or other outcomes.
Although some have interpreted Wood, Maltby, Stewart, and
Joseph (2008) as indicating that gratitude and appreciation are
merely different labels for the same construct, a close reading of
that paper reveals otherwise. As they recommended the conceptu-
alization of gratitude be expanded to include the other seven as-
pects of appreciation, they were acknowledging that appreciation
is a broader construct. This was claried in a subsequent paper
(i.e., Wood, Froh, & Geraghty, 2010) in which they argued for eight
aspects of gratitude. Rather than change the denition of grati-
tude to encompass the eight aspects of appreciation, it makes more
sense to preserve the term gratitude for gratitude, as traditionally
dened as grateful emotion directed toward a benefactor for
perceived benets (Fredrickson, 2004; Wood, Joseph, & Maltby,
2008). Using a different term for the higher-order, broader con-
struct should promote clarity, and appreciation seems an appropri-
ate term. Lambert, Graham, and Fincham (2009) also argued
another term was needed for the broader construct but suggested
generalized gratitude. So it appears possible and desirable to dis-
tinguish between gratitude and appreciation, as gratitude is only
one of eight aspects of appreciation and each may foster SWB.
1.2. How appreciation may promote SWB
Watkins, Woodward, Stone, and Kolts (2003) offered a multi-
component view of gratitude that maps onto ve aspects of appre-
ciation. They described sense of abundance and not feeling de-
prived (much like have focus), appreciation of simple
pleasures (capturing awe and present moment), and appreciation
of the contribution of others to ones well-being (capturing inter-
personal appreciation and gratitude) (Watkins et al., 2003, p. 449).
Watkins et al. (2003) suggested possible mechanisms by which
this multicomponent gratitude/appreciation might promote SWB.
They speculated it may (a) enhance experience of positive events
(b) enhance adaptive coping to negative events (c) enhance
encoding and retrieval of positive events (d) enhance ones
social network, and (e) prevent or mitigate depression (p. 449).
Additionally, by renewing valuing of what one has, appreciation
may decrease materialism (Polak & McCullough, 2006) and pre-
vent/decrease hedonic adaptation, leading to increased positive af-
fect and LS. It is normative to habituate to conditions, whatever
they may be. This likely helped humans cope with challenging con-
ditions in our evolutionary past when humans struggled to meet
basic needs and survive. They habituated to harsh conditions. Even
today it may help people cope with hardship. But for many people
in modern society, it robs them of happiness because they habitu-
ate to the good aspects of their lives. Good circumstances, experi-
ences, and relationships are taken for granted. So although
people may improve their relationships or standard of living, they
are not more satised, especially when change is gradual. Yet even
when change is sudden and dramatic, like falling in love or win-
ning the lottery, eventually one habituates, and the new way it
is is taken for granted (Brickman et al., 1978). This is the hedonic
treadmill (Sheldon & Lyubormirsky, 2006). Appreciation can func-
tion as a counter-force. Grateful/appreciative people may be less
likely to habituate to positive circumstances (McCullough, Em-
mons, & Tsang, 2002). If people, spontaneously or through training,
use cues such as rituals or experiences of adversity to remind
themselves to appreciate the positive aspects of their lives, then
wellbeing may be increased. Fredrickson (2004) also discussed
how gratitude may promote wellbeing. She argued that, in line
with her broaden-and-build theory of positive emotion, gratitude
builds personal and social resources, including skills for loving
and showing appreciation, and interpersonal relationships (Fred-
rickson, 2004, p. 152).
1.3. Research on appreciation and SWB
Research has demonstrated a connection between appreciation
and SWB (e.g., Adler & Fagley, 2005; McCullough et al., 2002;
 N.S. Fagley / Personality and Individual Differences 53 (2012) 5963 61

Tucker, 2007; Watkins et al., 2003). People with a greater tendency
to be grateful/appreciative also report greater LS. Wood, Joseph
et al. (2008) showed this was not due to gratitudes common var-
iance with the Big 5 personality traits. Brown and Ryan (2003)
found that mindfulness (the essence of the present moment aspect
of appreciation) was related to greater LS. As noted earlier, Adler
and Fagley (2005) showed that appreciation is signicantly related
to LS and positive affect, even when optimism, spirituality, and
self-awareness are controlled. Experimental manipulation of as-
pects of appreciation have suggested its role may be causal (e.g.,
Emmons & McCullough, 2003; Watkins et al., 2003).
Some aspects of appreciation are represented in the VIA classi-
cation of character strengths developed by positive psychologists
(i.e., Park, Peterson, & Seligman, 2004). For example, the awe as-
pect includes appreciation of beautyone of 24 character strengths
of the VIA classication. Similarly gratitude is included in the VIA.
Interpersonal appreciation captures the essence of the character
strength love, as dened in the VIA. According to Peterson and Park
(2009) love is dened as valuing close relations with others. Park
et al. (2004) found that love and gratitude were two of the ve
strengths most related to LS (Park et al., 2004), supporting the
importance of appreciation in LS.
2.2. Instruments
2.2.1. Appreciation
The Appreciation Scale (Adler & Fagley, 2005) measured appre-
ciation via subscales assessing eight theoretically-based aspects of
appreciation described earlier (see Table 1 for sample items). Adler
and Fagley (2005) reported reliabilities ranging from .73 for loss/
adversity to .84 for ritual, with the exception of self/social Compar-
ison, which was .62. They also reported evidence of validity based
on principal components analysis, correlations with variables in
the nomological net, and known groups. The 57 items are rated
17.
2.2.2. Gratitude
The GQ-6 (McCullough et al., 2002) measured dispositional
gratitude, viewed here as an aspect of appreciation. McCullough
et al. (2002) dened the grateful disposition as a generalized ten-
dency to recognize and respond with grateful emotion to the roles
of other peoples benevolence in the positive experiences and out-
comes that one obtains (p. 112). They reported coefcient alpha of
.82, and evidence of validity from several studies. Its six items are
rated 17.

2.2.3. The Big 5 personality traits

1.4. Big 5 personality traits, appreciation, and life satisfaction
The Big 5 personality traits explain a notable amount of individ-
ual differences in LS (Steel, Schmidt, & Shultz, 2008)about 18% of
the variance. Appreciation is likely related to the Big 5 personality
traits. For example, as appreciation involves positive affect, it is
probably related positively to agreeableness and negatively to neu-
roticism. As it promotes social ties, it is likely related to extraver-
sion. This raises the possibility that previously observed relations
between appreciation and LS may be due, at least partly, to vari-
ance shared with the Big 5 personality traits. For appreciation to
represent an important construct in its own right, it needs to ex-
plain variance beyond the Big 5 traits. There is, however, some rea-
son to expect appreciation may offer unique variance. Wood,
Joseph et al. (2008) showed that gratitude, viewed here as an as-
pect of appreciation, still made a signicant contribution to LS after
controlling for the Big 5 traits. But it is unclear if gratitude is the
only aspect of appreciation offering unique variance above the
Big 5 personality traits. The contribution of appreciation to LS
may represent variance shared with the Big 5 traits, and/or just
the variance due to gratitude, rather than variance unique to other
aspects of appreciation. This study addressed this issue. Does
appreciation contribute unique variance to LS, beyond demo-
graphic variables, the Big 5 personality factors, and gratitude?
The Big 5 Inventory (BFI; John, Donahue, & Kentle, 1991) mea-
sured the Big 5 personality traits of openness to experience, consci-
entiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. John,
Naumann, and Soto (2008) reported coefcient alpha from .87
to.79 and reviewed evidence of validity. Its 44 items are rated 15.
2.2.4. Life satisfaction
The Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Grif-
n, 1985) measured LS. It assesses individuals appraisal of how
satised they are with their lives. Diener et al. (1985) reported reli-
ability of .87; Pavot and Diener (1993) reported reliabilities from
.89 to .79 and evidence of validity. Its ve items are rated 17.
3. Results
Descriptive statistics and reliabilities are reported in Table 2.
Reliabilities ranged from .89 to .69. Alpha was set at .01 to con-
trol Type I error. Correlations between the appreciation subscales
and the Big 5 personality factors, gratitude, and LS are reported
Table 2
Descriptive statistics, reliability, and range of scales.

Mean SD Coefcient Theoretical

alpha range
2. Method
Life satisfaction 23.54 6.37 .89 535
Big 5
2.1. Participants and procedure
Openness 3.55 .52 .76 1050
Conscientiousness 3.44 .59 .80 945
Two hundred and forty-nine undergraduates in introductory Extraversion 3.35 .72 .85 840
psychology at a large university in the northeastern US completed Agreeableness 3.75 .58 .78 945
Neuroticism 2.93 .69 .82 840
an online questionnaire containing the measures of LS, Big 5 per-
Gratitude (GQ-6) 33.77 5.31 .79 642
sonality factors, gratitude, and appreciation. The residual plot re-
Appreciation
vealed no evidence of heteroscedasticity. One 17-year-old was
Have focus 54.53 8.18 .86 1070
removed, as participants needed to be P18 to provide informed Awe 29.17 5.65 .73 642
consent. Three cases constituting multivariate outliers were de- Ritual 27.67 7.34 .81 642
leted, as were two with standardized residuals greater than three, Present moment 36.64 6.17 .78 749
as recommended by Meyers, Gamst, and Guarino (2006), leaving Self/social comparison 25.35 4.67 .69 535
Gratitude 61.29 6.56 .79 1070
N = 243 (89 men; 154 women). Ethnicity of the sample was
Loss/adversity 42.25 7.03 .77 856
50.2% Caucasian, 26.3% Asian, 9.5% Latino, 7.8% African American, Interpersonal 25.69 4.97 .83 535
and 6.2% other. Ages ranged from 18 to 30.
62 N.S. Fagley / Personality and Individual Differences 53 (2012) 5963

Table 3 .06; F(1, 230) = 22.73, p < .001. In block 4, the appreciation sub-
Correlations (N = 243). scales were added to the regression. The change in R2 was .11;
Appreciation subscales F(8, 222) = 6.35, p < .001. This indicates appreciation makes a sig-
H A R P S G L I nicant unique contribution to LS, even after controlling for age,
ethnicity, gender, the Big 5 personality factors, and gratitude.
Big 5
O .30** .32** .14 .47** .26** .32** .21** .26**
C .37** .10 .24** .22** .22** .26** .24** .21**
E .33** .21** .20** .29** .14 .19* .27** .36**
4. Discussion
A .33** .19* .19* .32** .18* .40** .26** .29**
N .23** .11 .07 .16 .02 .06 .09 .10 Results support the importance of the Big 5 personality traits,
GQ-6 .60** .38** .37** .48** .36** .70** .47** .43** gratitude, and appreciation for LS. The Big 5 personality factors ac-
Life satisfaction .60** .35** .27** .41** .27** .28** .37** .41**
counted for about 31% of the variance in LS, over-and-above age,
*
p < .01. gender, and ethnicity. Gratitude added another 5.9%. Appreciation
**
p 6 .001. explained another 11% of the variance in LS after controlling for
gratitude, the Big 5 personality traits, and demographic vari-
ablesalmost twice as much as gratitude, as measured by the
in Table 3. Correlations between appreciation scales and the Big GQ-6. This is consistent with the theoretical stance that apprecia-
5 personality factors ranged from .03 to .47, in absolute value. So tion is more than just gratitude or the Big 5 personality factors and
although the appreciation scales were correlated with most of is important in its own right for LS.
the Big 5 personality factors except neuroticism, the sizes of The signicant contribution of gratitude replicates and extends
the correlations indicated only modest overlap. Neuroticism the results of Wood, Joseph et al. (2008). Current results provide
showed little relation to appreciation, with the exception of additional support for their nding, as the same result was ob-
have focus with which it correlated .23. tained even after controlling for sex, age, and ethnicity and a differ-
A hierarchical multiple regression analysis was computed. All ent instrument measured the Big 5 personality traits. However,
tolerance values exceeded .10 (and VIFs < 10) indicating no prob- this result is only obtained if gratitude enters the regression prior
lems with multicollinearity (Meyers et al., 2006). Also, the largest to appreciation, as demonstrated by the alternate analysis pre-
correlation between predictors was .71, less than .8, the heuristic sented next.
gure suggesting possible multicollinearity (Meyers et al., 2006). An alternate regression analysis in which appreciation was en-
In block 1, LS scores were regressed on the demographic variables tered in block 3 and gratitude in block 4 revealed that appreciation
(age, gender, and ethnicityrepresented as four dichotomous vari- accounts for 16% of the variance in LS, over-and-above the Big 5
ables). The R2 of .04 was not signicant; F(6, 236) = 1.59, p = .15. In personality factors and demographic variables (p < .001). When
block 2, the Big 5 personality factors were added to the regression the GQ-6 is entered in block 4, its contribution of 1.3% is not signif-
(see Table 4). The change in R2 was .31; F(5, 231) = 21.98, p < .001. icant at the .01 level, indicating gratitude contributes no unique
In block 3, gratitude (the GQ-6) was added. The change in R2 was variance, beyond appreciation, the Big 5 traits, and demographic
variables.
Table 4 The study is the rst to document the correlations between
Hierarchical multiple regression of life satisfaction onto demographic variables, Big 5 appreciation subscales and the Big 5 personality factors (see Table
traits, gratitude, and appreciation subscales.
3), and they correlate in expected ways. For example, the largest
Variable Beta t p R2 change correlation between an appreciation scale and Big 5 factor was
Block 1: .04; F(6, 236) = 1.59, .47 between present moment and openness to experience. That
p = .15 is, the more one focuses with mindful awareness on the present
Sex .08 1.25 .21 moment, the greater ones openness to experience. Similarly, the
Age .10 1.46 .15
greater ones interpersonal appreciation (valuing others and
African American .02 0.17 .87
Asian .18 1.41 .16 expressing it), the more extraverted one tends to be. Finally, as ex-
Latino/Hispanic .05 0.51 .61 pected, neuroticism had little relation to any appreciation subscale,
White .03 0.19 .85 with seven of eight correlations 6.10.
Block 2: .31; F(5, 231) = 21.98, As expected, the Gratitude subscale exhibited the highest corre-
p < .001 lation with the GQ-6 measure of gratitude. The correlation of .7
Openness to .05 0.84 .40
was the highest observed. When looking at the correlations with
experience
Conscientiousness .20 3.24 .001
LS, it is interesting to note that the have focus aspect of appreci-
Extraversion .24 3.99 <.001 ation exhibited the highest correlation with LS (r = .60)higher
Agreeableness .12 1.91 .06 than any of the Big 5 personality factors, which ranged from .19
Neuroticism .26 4.08 <.001 to .41 in absolute value, or the GQ-6. This suggests the key compo-
Block 3: .06; F(1, 230)= 22.73, nent of the appreciative worldview for LS is its focus on what one
p < .001 has.
Gratitude (GQ-6) .30 4.77 <.001
Block 4: .11; F(8, 222)= 6.35,
p < .001 4.1. Limitations and future directions
Have focus .56 5.49 <.001
Awe .04 0.58 .56 One limitation of the study is its reliance on self-report. It would
Ritual .17 2.50 .01
be valuable for future research to consider using peer or spouse
Present moment .06 0.67 .50
Self/social .12 1.70 .09 ratings. Also, inducing various aspects of appreciation, such as
comparison gratitude or awe, then studying relations over time could provide
Gratitude .16 2.26 .03 more information about causal connections. Another limitation is
Loss/adversity .07 0.93 .36 that a single population of participants was sampled. Subsequent
Interpersonal .01 0.13 .90
research could examine whether the same results would be ob-
Note. Signicant effects are bolded. Final R2 = .52; F(20, 222) = 11.91, p < .001. tained from samples differing in age or culture/nationality.
 N.S. Fagley / Personality and Individual Differences 53 (2012) 5963
Although no differences were observed based on age or ethnicity,
most participants were young and attending college in the US. Peo-
ple from cultures with different religious traditions, or role models
of humility versus entitlement, may exhibit different distributions
on the variables and different relationships among the variables.
Future research could also examine whether appreciation makes
a unique contribution to positive affect (another component of
SWB) and psychological well-being (PWB), which differs from
SWB (Ryff, 1989). Ryff dened PWB as consisting of six factors:
autonomy, positive relations with others, environmental mastery,
self-acceptance, personal growth, and purpose in life. Appreciation
could exhibit a different relationship to LS than to autonomy, for
example. As gratitude explains unique variance in PWB above
the Big 5 (Wood, Joseph, & Maltby, 2009), it seems reasonable to
hypothesize the same for appreciation. Further, it seems likely that
some aspects of appreciation will be more closely related to some
components of PWB than others. For example, it seems likely that
both gratitude and interpersonal appreciation are more closely tied
to positive relations with others than the other aspects of
appreciation.
Finally, using the framework of appreciation, which species
eight aspects, and maintaining the distinctions among them should
facilitate planning future research on appreciation and/or gratitude
and developing interventions to foster appreciation, and ulti-
mately, LS and other valued outcomes. In fact, several interven-
tions targeting different aspects have already been developed.
Frias, Watkins, Webber, and Froh (2011) targeted the loss/adver-
sity aspect of appreciation, and Gordon, Arnette, and Smith
(2011) targeted the interpersonal aspect (see also Lambert & Fin-
cham, 2011). The researchers, however, referred to their targets
as gratitude, which does little to clarify the differences. Thinking
about almost dying in an apartment re has little apparent similar-
ity to daily expressions of gratitude/appreciation to ones spouse.
Recognizing that they represent different aspects of appreciation
provides a useful theoretical framework. Intervening to change a
particular aspect of appreciation may clarify causal processes and
mechanisms leading to increased LS, positive affect, improved
interpersonal relationships, and other valued outcomes. In fact,
work on interpersonal appreciation and gratitude is showing they
are important in developing and maintaining social bonds (e.g., Al-
goe, Haidt, & Gable, 2008; Lambert & Fincham, 2011), as theorized
by Adler & Fagley, 2005 (Adler, 2002; Fagley & Adler, in press) and
others (e.g., Fredrickson, 2004). It seems likely that different as-
pects relate differently to different outcomes of interest. For exam-
ple, in the current study, LS correlated .60 with have focus, but
only .27 with self/social comparison (a signicant difference,
p < .01), so have focus accounted for over four times as much var-
iance in LS as self/social comparison. Finally, different processes
and mechanisms may underlie these connections, so maintaining
the distinction among the eight aspects may promote discovering
these processes and mechanisms in future research.
References
Adler, M. G. (2002). Conceptualizing and measuring appreciation: The development of a
positive psychology construct. Doctoral dissertation, Rutgers University, New
Brunswick, NJ.
Adler, M. G., & Fagley, N. S. (2005). Appreciation: Individual differences in nding
value and meaning as a unique predictor of subjective well-being. Journal of
Personality, 73, 79114.
Algoe, S., Haidt, J., & Gable, S. L. (2008). Beyond reciprocity: Gratitude and
relationships in everyday life. Emotion, 8, 425429.
63
Brickman, P., Coates, D., & Janoff-Bulman, R. (1978). Lottery winners and accident
victims: Is happiness relative? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36,
917927.
Brown, K. W., & Ryan, R. M. (2003). The benets of being present: Mindfulness and
its role in psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
84, 822848.
Bryant, F. B., & Veroff, J. (2007). Savoring: A new model of positive experience.
Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Diener, E., Emmons, R. A., Larsen, R. J., & Grifn, S. (1985). The satisfaction with life
scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 49, 7175.
Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: An
experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84, 377389.
Fagley, N. S., & Adler, M. G. (in press). Appreciation: A spiritual path to nding value
and meaning in the workplace. Journal of Management, Spirituality, and Religion.
Fredrickson, B. L. (2004). Gratitude, like other positive emotions, broadens and
builds. In R. A. Emmons & M. E. McCullough (Eds.), The psychology of gratitude.
Oxford.
Frias, A., Watkins, P. C., Webber, A. C., & Froh, J. J. (2011). Death and gratitude: Death
reection enhances gratitude. Journal of Positive Psychology, 6, 154162.
Gordon, C. L., Arnette, R. A. M., & Smith, R. E. (2011). Have you thanked your spouse
today?: Felt and expressed gratitude among married couples. Personality and
Individual Differences, 50, 339343.
Janoff-Bulman, R., & Berger, A. R. (2000). The other side of trauma: Towards a
psychology of appreciation. In J. H. Harvey & E. D. Miller (Eds.), Loss and trauma
(pp. 2944). New York: Brunner-Routledge.
John, O. P., Donahue, E. M., & Kentle, R. L. (1991). The big ve inventoryversions 4a
and 54. Berkeley, CA: UC Berkeley, Institute of Personality and Social Research.
John, O. P., Naumann, L. P., & Soto, C. J. (2008). Paradigm shift to the integrative Big-
Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement, and conceptual issues. In O. P. John,
R. W. Robins, & L. A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of personality (pp. 114158). New
York, NY: Guilford.
Lambert, N. M., & Fincham, F. D. (2011). Expressing gratitude to a partner leads to
more relationship maintenance behavior. Emotion, 11, 5260.
Lambert, N. M., Graham, S. M., & Fincham, F. D. (2009). A prototype analysis of
gratitude: Varieties of gratitude experiences. Personality and Social Psychology
Bulletin, 35, 11931207.
McCullough, M. E., Emmons, R. A., & Tsang, J. S. (2002). The grateful disposition: A
conceptual and empirical topography. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 82, 112127.
Meyers, L. S., Gamst, G., & Guarino, A. (2006). Applied multivariate research.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Park, N., Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. (2004). Strengths of character and well-being.
Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 23, 603619.
Pavot, W., & Diener, E. (1993). Review of the satisfaction with life scale. Psychological
Assessment, 5, 164172.
Peterson, C., & Park, N. (2009). Classifying and measuring strengths of character. In
S. Lopez & C. R. Snyder (Eds.), Oxford handbook of positive psychology (2nd ed..
New York: Oxford.
Polak, E. L., & McCullough, M. E. (2006). Is gratitude an alternative to materialism?
Journal of Happiness Studies, 7, 343360.
Ryff, C. D. (1989). Happiness is everything, or is it? Explorations on the meaning of
psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57,
10691081.
Sheldon, K., & Lyubormirsky, S. (2006). How to increase and sustain positive
emotion: The effects of expressing gratitude and visualizing best possible
selves. Journal of Positive Psychology, 1, 7382.
Steel, P., Schmidt, J., & Shultz, J. (2008). Rening the relationship between
personality and subjective well-being. Psychological Bulletin, 134, 138161.
Suls, J. M., & Wheeler, L. (Eds.). (2000). Handbook of social comparison. New York:
Plenum.
Tucker, K. L. (2007). Getting the most out of life: An examination of appreciation,
targets of appreciation, and sensitivity to reward in happier and less happy
individuals. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 26, 791825.
Watkins, P. C., Woodward, K., Stone, T., & Kolts, R. L. (2003). Gratitude and
happiness: Development of a measure of gratitude, and relationships with
subjective well-being. Social Behavior and Personality, 31, 431452.
Wood, A. M., Froh, J. J., & Geraghty, A. (2010). Gratitude and well-being: A review
and theoretical integration. Clinical Psychology Review, 30, 890905.
Wood, A. M., Joseph, S., & Maltby, J. (2008). Gratitude uniquely predicts satisfaction
with life: Incremental validity above the domains and facets of the ve factor
model. Personality and Individual Differences, 45, 4954.
Wood, A. M., Joseph, S., & Maltby, J. (2009). Gratitude uniquely predicts
psychological well-being above the Big Five facets. Personality and Individual
Differences, 45, 4954.
Wood, A. M., Maltby, J., Stewart, N., & Joseph, S. (2008). Conceptualizing gratitude
and appreciation as a unitary personality trait. Personality and Individual
Differences, 44, 619630.