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The Power of Gratitude: How Thankfulness May Extend Your Life

Several evenings a week, as Tyler VanderWeele gathers around the dinner table with his wife and two young kids, the family deliberately pauses during the meal to do something simple but profound: each member shares several things for which they’re grateful. “Even on those bad days where life seems difficult, that effort is worthwhile,” says VanderWeele, co-director of the Initiative on Health, Spirituality, and Religion at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Research has long linked gratitude to greater emotional and social well-being, better sleep quality, lower depression risk, and favorable cardiovascular markers. Now, new data from the long-term Nurses’ Health Study suggest it may also extend lives.

Study Design and Participants

  • Published July 2024 in JAMA Psychiatry—first study examining gratitude’s effects on mortality and longevity.
  • Data from 49,275 women enrolled in the Nurses’ Health Study; average age 79.
  • In 2016, participants completed a six-item gratitude questionnaire (e.g., “I have so much in life to be thankful for”).
  • Four years later, medical records revealed 4,608 deaths from all causes, including cardiovascular disease (the most common cause), cancer, respiratory diseases, neurodegenerative disease, infection, and injury.

Key Findings

  • Women with gratitude scores in the highest third had a 9% lower risk of dying over four years compared with those in the lowest third.
  • Results held after controlling for physical health, socioeconomic status, and other mental health and well-being factors.
  • Gratitude appeared protective across every cause of death studied, especially cardiovascular disease.

Possible Mechanisms

  • Increased happiness, which itself can lower mortality risk.
  • Greater motivation for health behaviors (e.g., attending medical appointments, exercising).
  • Enhanced relationships and social support.

Strengths and Limitations

  • Observational design: association does not prove causation.
  • Sample limited to older, mostly white female nurses with high socioeconomic status.
  • Strengths include large sample size and extensive data on confounding factors.

Practical Gratitude Practices

  • Daily reflection: ask yourself what you’re grateful for today.
  • Family gratitude ritual: share thanks around the dinner table.
  • Write thank-you notes or gratitude letters to deepen positive focus and relationships.
  • Savoring exercises: pause, look around, and fully enjoy what’s good in your current setting.
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