Gratitude, Happiness & Their Relation with Triguna Personality

Abstract

Background: Gratitude, which refers to being thankful and appreciative, is missing now-a-days. People don’t express enough gratitude and take others for granted. In positive psychology realm, gratitude is strongly related with greater happiness which refers to positive emotions and life satisfaction degree. But gratitude doesn’t come easily to everyone. Some people have more grateful dispositions than others. This depends on one’s personality which we can study by an important holistic vedic approach of personality known as triguna. Objective: The objective of this study is threefold: (1) to examine correlation between sattva, gratitude and happiness; (2) to examine correlation between rajas, gratitude and happiness; (3) to examine correlation between tamas, gratitude and happiness. Materials and Method:  I conducted a cross-sectional survey among 103 participants from a  population of adults aged between 20 to 65 years, both males and females. To collect the required data, “Gratitude scale (GQ-6) developed by McCullough M., E. (2013)” which consists of 6 items, “Subjective Happiness Scale (SHS)  developed by Lyubomirsky & Lepper. (1999)” which consists of 4 items and “Vedic Personality Inventory (VPI) developed by Wolf, D. B. (1999)” which consists of 56 items were administered to all participants. Result: The research shows that there is a significant moderate positive correlation of sattva with gratitude (r = .57, p < .01) and happiness (r = .52, p < .01),  significant moderate negative correlation of rajas with gratitude (r = -.36, p < .01) and happiness (r = -.46, p < .01) and significant moderate negative correlation of tamas with gratitude (r = -.46, p < .01) and happiness (r = – .46, p < .01). Further, regression analysis shows that both gratitude (ß = .39, p < .01) and happiness (ß = .28, p < .01) predict a higher sattva.Conclusion: The findings show that increase in expessing gratitude and happiness leads to an increase in sattva.This results in a better state of equilibrium with the least agitation of mind amongst all trigunas thereby making one more functional to lead a better life in this world.