TY - JOUR
T1 - Being Present and Thankful
T2 - A Multi-Study Investigation of Mindfulness, Gratitude, and Employee Helping Behavior
AU - Sawyer, Katina B.
AU - Thoroughgood, Christian N.
AU - Stillwell, Elizabeth E.
AU - Duffy, Michelle K.
AU - Scott, Kristin L.
AU - Adair, Elizabeth A.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021. American Psychological Association
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - Gratitude plays an integral role in promoting helping behavior at work. Thus, cultivating employees’ experiences of gratitude represents an important imperative in modern organizations that rely on teamwork and collaboration to achieve organizational goals. Yet, today’s workplace presents a complex array of demands that make it difficult for employees to fully attend to and appreciate the various benefits they receive at work. As such, gratitude is difficult for employers to promote and for employees to experience. Despite these observations, the role of attention and awareness in facilitating employees’ feelings of gratitude is largely overlooked in the extant literature. In this study, we examined whether one notable form of present moment attention, mindfulness, may promote helping behavior by stimulating the positive, otheroriented emotion of gratitude. Across two experimental studies, a semiweekly, multisource diary study, and a 10-day experience sampling investigation, we found converging evidence for a serial mediation model in which state mindfulness, via positive affect and perspective taking, prompts greater levels of gratitude, prosocial motivation, and, in turn, helping behavior at work. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our investigation, as well as avenues for the future research.
AB - Gratitude plays an integral role in promoting helping behavior at work. Thus, cultivating employees’ experiences of gratitude represents an important imperative in modern organizations that rely on teamwork and collaboration to achieve organizational goals. Yet, today’s workplace presents a complex array of demands that make it difficult for employees to fully attend to and appreciate the various benefits they receive at work. As such, gratitude is difficult for employers to promote and for employees to experience. Despite these observations, the role of attention and awareness in facilitating employees’ feelings of gratitude is largely overlooked in the extant literature. In this study, we examined whether one notable form of present moment attention, mindfulness, may promote helping behavior by stimulating the positive, otheroriented emotion of gratitude. Across two experimental studies, a semiweekly, multisource diary study, and a 10-day experience sampling investigation, we found converging evidence for a serial mediation model in which state mindfulness, via positive affect and perspective taking, prompts greater levels of gratitude, prosocial motivation, and, in turn, helping behavior at work. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our investigation, as well as avenues for the future research.
KW - Gratitude
KW - Mindfulness
KW - Organizational citizenship behavior
KW - Perspective taking
KW - Positive affect
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U2 - 10.1037/apl0000903
DO - 10.1037/apl0000903
M3 - Article
C2 - 33844565
AN - SCOPUS:85108350901
SN - 0021-9010
VL - 107
SP - 240
EP - 262
JO - Journal of Applied Psychology
JF - Journal of Applied Psychology
IS - 2
ER -