Nick Hebbink

This article justifies virtuous gratitude as an aim of formal education. This virtue is characterised by the disposition to perceive, think, feel and act in accordance with the moral ideal of acknowledging and cherishing the gratuitous good in life. At its heart lies a conscientious commitment to this ideal, infused with a concern for truth, justice and wellbeing. This virtue also requires guidance by wisdom, and a capacity for reflective awareness and imagination. We map risks accompanying misguided gratitude and the shortcomings that must be overcome to avoid them. We demonstrate why this virtue is both conducive to and constitutive of flourishing—an important overarching aim of education. Virtuous gratitude can deepen people’s outlook and promote ongoing self-cultivation and wisdom. Thus, fostering this virtue not only necessitates education but contributes to it. We conclude that virtuous gratitude is not merely a legitimate aim, but a required aim of formal education.

The present ecological crises that mark the Anthropocene make it clear that our exploitative way of relating to the world undermines the potential of humans and many other beings to flourish on Earth. Therefore, education should be concerned with fostering awareness and understanding of the value and vulnerability of (the conditions for life on) our planet, and our dependency in relation to this good. Gratitude experiences are characterized by and can contribute to such forms of awareness, types of understanding, and corresponding motivations to cherish certain goods. Moreover, experiences of existential gratitude can enrich our relationships with the natural world – focusing, beyond instrumental benefits, on our interconnectedness with its intrinsically valuable entities. Such experiences can provide us with meaning by deepening our sense of identity, and by infusing our lives with a sense of moral responsibility to care for the ecosystems we are part of. Thus, gratitude not only has the potential to enhance flourishing, but may also influence how we approach the ontological-ethical question of what it means to be and flourish as a human being. However, there seems to be a tension between existential gratitude and central elements of the modern western worldview that appear to bear the mark of humanism. We discuss how humanism can disentangle itself from this problematic worldview, and explore how wonder and awe can help to foster existential gratitude within the framework of humanistic education.

This article offers a theoretical investigation of the educational value of gratitude. We make the case that it is possible to learn from and through gratitude experiences. More specifically, gratitude experiences include understandings regarding and a reflective awareness of the value, contingency and vulnerability of certain goods as well as one's dependency in relation to these goods. We argue that such experiences can transform one's outlook on life in a sense that is educationally relevant and valuable in relation to one's flourishing. Building on this, we claim that gratitude can contribute to the development of wisdom. However, since the interpretations of the world inherent in gratitude can be epistemically inaccurate and/or morally inappropriate, gratitude experiences must also be guided by wisdom. Instead of blindly accepting the perceptions implicit in gratitude experiences, people must reflect on these with genuine care for the truth and for justice. We suggest that educators can bring their wisdom and concern for justice to bear in stimulating and guiding others' gratitude experiences in a desirable manner, especially in the case of young people, whose reflective capacities are still developing. We conclude that gratitude experiences should be recognized as a potential source of educationally valuable forms of awareness and insights.

In this paper we defend the idea that dyadic gratitude — i.e. gratitude in absence of a benefactor — is a coherent concept. Some authors claim that ‘gratitude’ is by definition a triadic concept involving a beneficiary who is grateful for a benefit to a benefactor. These authors state that people who use the term gratitude in absence of a benefactor do so inappropriately, e.g. by using it as an interchangeable term for ‘appreciation’ or ‘being glad’. We believe that the conceptual analyses which underlie such statements are too strongly focused on language and pay insufficient attention to the lived experience of gratitude. Thus, we have conducted a phenomenological analysis of several experiences in which people report feeling gratitude in absence of a benefactor. Informed by our phenomenological findings, we argue that dyadic gratitude is a coherent concept that shares certain core experiential elements with triadic gratitude. Gratitude is an appreciative response that construes its object as a gratuitous good and as a (metaphorical) gift; it is characterised by a receptive-appreciative attitude, an awareness that we are in some sense dependent on something other than ourselves, and a motivational impetus to promote, celebrate and/or radiate goodness. Finally, we argue that dyadic gratitude is a useful concept because it enables us to think and communicate effectively about a set of experiences. Moreover, it is also a scientifically and philosophically relevant concept, since it seems to be associated with various positive psychosocial effects and might even be developed as a virtuous disposition.