The harmful side of expressing thanks: Re-examining the Study 2 by Ksenofontov and Becker (2020)

This study re-examined the results of Study 2 by Ksenofontov and Becker (2020) that revealed the harmful effects of expressing thanks by low-power group members to a high-power group member who transgressed and then did them a favor, which resulted in undermining the low-power group members’ protest intentions. They also found a mediating effect of forgiveness; expressing thanks functions as an act of forgiveness, which lowers the intention to protest. Contrary to their results, we did not find any significant effects of expressing thanks on protest intentions or forgiveness in either of the two hypothetical scenarios. The original study involved participants from German universities, whereas the present study was conducted on Japanese students. Therefore, the cultural difference in expressing gratitude could have been a factor in the contrasting results.本研究はJPSP科研費21K02978の助成を受けた