Who’s listening when you say “thank you”? It matters more than you might think
There may be more to a simple “thank you” than meets the ear. Northeastern researchers found that witnessing someone express gratitude creates a halo effect that makes observers want to interact or collaborate with them.
There are many ways to say thank you.
The greeting card aisle is just the beginning. An array of Lindor truffle tins, fridge magnets, custom Hershey’s Kisses or plush “thanks a ton!” elephants can deliver the message.
There’s even a company that will print a gratitude message directly on a potato,pack it in a gold box with tinsel and mail it to that special someone.
Or — you can just say it.
Either way, your “thank you” is bound to make the recipient feel good. But have you ever thought about what it says to those watching from the sidelines?
That’s exactly what Northeastern University psychology professor David DeSteno and Ph.D. student Alexandra Gray set out to study. Their paper, titled “Gleaning Information from a “Thank You”: How Witnessing Expressions of Gratitude Shape Perceptions of and Actions Toward Others,” was published in the journal Affective Science in June. As Gray explained, she saw a gap in existing research on third party gratitude observers. What does a “thank you” tell an observer about the person expressing it? Understanding those inferences could explain how people identify potential friends, collaborators and other social partners.
“No one before 2020 had looked at effects [on] third party observers,” Gray said. Previous studies found that watching someone express gratitude makes others see them as a better social partner, according to Gray and DeSteno.
For better or worse, it also makes them more willing to give the grateful stranger the full scoop on their personal lives.
It makes sense that gratitude inspires collaboration. As psychologist and author of “An Organizational Approach to Workplace Bullying” Debra Stewart told Northeastern Global News, “gratitude creates a need for reciprocity,” changing the dynamics between people.
But why would it have a similar effect when the appreciative gesture is observed from a distance?
The answer could lie in the traits people subconsciously bestow on the thanker. This phenomenon is known as the halo effect, Gray explained.
To find out what those traits might be, the researchers recruited 335 adults to watch videos of a familiar workplace mishap. A computer malfunctions and a helpful colleague swoops in to save the day.
In the first video, a worker who received assistance expressed joyful relief, saying “Wonderful! I was so close to finishing, so this is great!”.
The second featured another worker in the same situation explicitly saying “thank you.”
Participants then used a 7-point scale to rank the extent to which they believed these two workers possessed moral attributes such as honesty, helpfulness, consideration, generosity, sincerity, fairness and kindness. They also rated how strongly the workers appeared to exhibit a broader set of positive traits ranging from intelligence and warmth to enthusiasm and attractiveness.
As it turned out, participants associated the worker who explicitly thanked the helpful colleague more strongly with both sets of halo traits.
That’s right — in addition to making you look helpful and trustworthy, simply saying the so-called magic words apparently makes you seem extraverted, intelligent and even attractive, the test revealed.
In this way, gratitude expressions “actually communicate things to other people who are outside the interaction,” Gray said.
Some of the primary and even secondary halo characteristics seem logical.
Gray explained that by saying thank you, “you’re showing that you’re a very supportive and validating person.”
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Jonah Primo, host of “The Overexamined Life,” a podcast about the science and philosophy of living with purpose, put it this way: “We have few more obvious ways of being recognized, of being reassured that our efforts … are valued by another human” than by showing gratitude.
As a result, it’s not a stretch to see how thankers could be seen as helpful, generous, sincere, considerate or kind. Someone who acknowledges another person’s good deed may seem likely to also notice your needs and respond with compassion and care, Gray explained.
The study also confirmed previous findings that observers see “thankers” as more responsive and are more willing to collaborate with them. If the person who was grateful comes across as supportive or kind, they naturally seem like a good candidate for partnership, Gray explained.
A similar logic could help explain previous findings about responsiveness, closeness and trustworthiness, which have character prerequisites that closely match the primary halo traits.
“We’re all looking for people we can count on, people we can trust, and an expression of gratitude gives us an insight into a stranger’s moral character,” DeSteno explained.
“It tells us they might be a better bet to be a friend or relationship partner,” he said.
Some of the other expanded halo characteristics, however, are a bit more of a headscratcher.
“There are a bunch of other traits in there like intelligence, competence, attractiveness, extroversion that don’t necessarily make sense,” Gray said.
Those oddballs might simply be along for the ride — and it wouldn’t be the first time, Gray explained. Previous research found that once we decide someone has certain positive qualities, we tend to tack these particular add-ons onto the mix, she said.
The researchers also don’t know how long the halo sticks around. Asking participants the same questions about the workers a week later or in a different context could show it has an expiration date, they said.
Regardless, Gray thinks that a simple thank-you could make a difference by providing an unexpected opening for a new relationship.
After all, you just don’t know who might be listening, she said.
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