The DOI matches its Crossref record; 144 of the 144 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Is gratitude a moral affect?
Abstract
Gratitude is conceptualized as a moral affect that is analogous to other moral emotions such as empathy and guilt. Gratitude has 3 functions that can be conceptualized as morally relevant: (a) a moral barometer function (i.e., it is a response to the perception that one has been the beneficiary of another person's moral actions); (b) a moral motive function (i.e., it motivates the grateful person to behave prosocially toward the benefactor and other people); and (c) a moral reinforcer function (i.e., when expressed, it encourages benefactors to behave morally in the future). The personality and social factors that are associated with gratitude are also consistent with a conceptualization of gratitude as an affect that is relevant to people's cognitions and behaviors in the moral domain.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“two new perspectives highlight the lasting personal and social benefits of the positive emotions of gratitude (McCullough, Kil-patrick, Emmons, & Larson, 2001; see also Fredrickson, 2000d) and elevation (Haidt, 2000).”
From The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. (2001) · cites this paper as McCullough, Kil-patrick, Emmons, & Larson, 2001
In the citing paper
“Gratitude and forgiveness require distinct attributions (Fincham, Paleari, & Regalia, 2002; McCullough, Emmons, & Tsang, 2002) but share a common, fundamental component of empathy (Farrow et al., 2001; Lazarus, 1991; Macaskill, Maltby, & Day, 2002; McCullough, Kilpatrick, Emmons, & Larson, 2001).”
From Gratitude and forgiveness: convergence and divergence on self-report and informant ratings. (2010) · cites this paper as McCullough, Kilpatrick, Emmons, & Larson, 2001
Citations
Cites
The psychology of interpersonal relations
Heider, F. (1958) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.2307/2089062 · Cited by 17,189
Erikson, E. H. (2026) · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · doi:10.5281/zenodo.18614668 · Cited by 13,081
Lazarus, R. S. (1991) · doi:10.1093/oso/9780195069945.001.0001 · Cited by 12,691
The norm of reciprocity: A preliminary statement
Gouldner, A. W. (1960) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.2307/2092623 · Cited by 12,001
Politeness : Some Universals in Language Usage
Brown, P. (1987) · Cited by 11,901
The Evolution of Reciprocal Altruism
Trivers, R. L. (1971) · The Quarterly Review of Biology · doi:10.1086/406755 · Cited by 11,010
A new scale of social desirability independent of psychopathology.
Crowne, D. P., & Marlowe, D. (1960) · Journal of Consulting Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0047358 · Cited by 8,686
An attributional theory of achievement motivation and emotion
Weiner, B. (1985) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.92.4.548 · Cited by 7,846
The Cognitive Structure of Emotions
Ortony, A., Clore, G. L., & Collins, A. (1988) · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511571299 · Cited by 6,208
What good are positive emotions?
Fredrickson, B. L. (1998) · Review of General Psychology · doi:10.1037/1089-2680.2.3.300 · Cited by 6,066
Research works printed but not linked: 13
- Batson, 1991, The altruism question.
- 10.1207/s15324834basp1601&2_12 · DOI
- Baumgartner-Tramer, 1938, The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 53, 53
- Costa, 1992, NEO-PI-R professionalmanual.
- Davis, 1994, Empathy: A social psychologicalapproach.
- de Rivera, 1977, A structural theory of theemotions.
- 10.1037/0022-3514.70.4.820 · DOI
- Heider, 1958, The psychology of interpersonalrelations.
- Kernberg, 1975, Borderline conditions and pathologicalnarcissism.
- Moore, 1996, Americans most thankful for family and health:young also thankful for career/job.
- Oatley, 1992, Best laid schemes.
- Shapiro, 1984, Help seeking: Why people don't., Research in the Sociology of Organizations, 3, 213
- 10.1037/0012-1649.34.3.403 · DOI
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Items 1,001–1,003 of 1,003
Religion/Spirituality and the Twin Virtues of Humility and Gratitude
Cauble, M. R., Said, I. A., McLaughlin, A. T., Gazaway, S., Tongeren, D. R. V., Hook, J. N., Lacey, E. K., Davis, E. B., & Davis, D. E. (2022) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-10274-5_24 · Cited by 4
Nostalgia increases punitiveness by intensifying moral concern
Lasaleta, J. D., Wildschut, T., & Sedikides, C. (2024) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/s41598-024-61858-x · Cited by 3
Brunzell, T., Stokes, H., & Waters, L. (2016) · Contemporary School Psychology · doi:10.1007/s40688-015-0070-0
Metadata
- Authors
- McCullough, M. E., Kilpatrick, S. D., Emmons, R. A., & Larson, D. B.
- Affiliations
- Southern Methodist University (US)
- University of California, Davis (US)
- Venue
- Psychological Bulletin
- Published
- 2001-03
- Volume
- 127
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 249-266
- ISSN
- 0033-2909 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1455
- OpenAlex
- W2014281368
- Cited by
- 1,698
- References
- 143
- Citations by year
- 2026: 76 · 2025: 123 · 2024: 103 · 2023: 117 · 2022: 137 · 2021: 131 · 2020: 125 · 2019: 105 · 2018: 72 · 2017: 82 · 2016: 92 · 2015: 92 · 2014: 90 · 2013: 69 · 2012: 48
- FWCI
- 15.38
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Psychological Bulletin (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Emotions and Moral Behavior
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Psychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment
- Keywords
- gratitude, moral emotions, prosocial behavior, empathy, guilt, moral cognition, personality factors
- MeSH terms
- Affect, Humans, Interpersonal Relations, Models, Psychological, Morals, Motivation, Social Behavior
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
