How diverse beliefs shape the experience of transcendent gratitude

ABSTRACT As a novel contribution, this study considers transcendent gratitude (e.g. gratitude towards non-human benefactors such as God, Science, or Karma) across diverse belief systems. The sample included 619 participants (M age 37.5, 52.6% female) across the U.S. with beliefs across three distinct categories: a) Theistic; 38.4%), b) Spiritual but not theistic; 26.4%, and c) Non-theistic/Non-spiritual (Other); 35.2%. Across the three belief systems, we tested the associations between gratitude and theistic predictors (e.g. feeling comfort or anger towards God, fidelity, interaction with God, attachment to God, and transcendent indebtedness) and non-theistic predictors (e.g. life comprehension, primal beliefs, prosocial behavioral intentions, and interpersonal attachment). Interestingly, we found that participants from all belief categories experienced transcendent gratitude. Comfort, anger, transcendent indebtedness, life comprehension, and prosocial intentions were robust predictors of transcendent gratitude across belief categories. We conclude with recommendations for more nuanced models of transcendent gratitude.


The Importance of Transcendence
Gratitude is the ability to recognize the good in one's life and acknowledge an outside-the-self source of those benefits (Emmons & Stern, 2013) and is integral to positive well-being (Jans-Beken et al., 2020;McCullough et al., 2002).Not surprisingly, practices aimed to cultivate gratitude are prominent across cultures, world religions, and positive psychology interventions (Nelson et al., in press).Indeed, research has amassed over the last couple of decades, demonstrating the efficacy of gratitude interventions promoting well-being (e.g (Dickens, 2017;Zhang et al., 2022).Gratitude enhances well-being by orienting people to the positives in their lives (Atad & Russo-Netzer, 2021), suppressing negative emotions (e.g.Fekete & Deichert, 2022), and cultivating selftranscendent motivations (Nelson, Hendricks, et al., 2023).
Acknowledging beyond-the-self sources of benefits is a fundamental task of gratitude (Algoe, 2012;Emmons & Stern, 2013).Despite this, much of the existing research on gratitude focuses on intrapersonal and interpersonal gratitude, neglecting transcendent sources of benefits.This oversight seems odd given that historically, gratitude norms evolved alongside rich transcendent belief systems (Tsang & Martin, 2016).Evidence from emerging research examining gratitude to God demonstrates that theistic gratitude practices provide unique benefits for believers (Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023;Rosmarin et al., 2011;Tsang et al., 2023).Nevertheless, the emerging research exploring gratitude to God neglects the belief systems outside of traditional theistic religions.If acknowledging transcendent sources of benefits (i.e.transcendent gratitude) is a universally human endeavor, then transcendent gratitude should be present across diverse belief systems.In fact, we argue that sensitivity to belief diversity is especially relevant with the rapid decline of committed theists in the U.S. (Pew Research Center, 2019) and the simultaneous proliferation of alternative transcendent beliefs (Smith, 2021).Thus, we hypothesize that transcendent gratitude is still experienced by non-theistic believers but may have different predictors.Importantly, given the variability in belief systems, we posit that transcendent gratitude involves various characteristic adaptations (e.g.psychological tendencies such as attachment or primal beliefs).Specifically, we posit that transcendent gratitude is influenced by both characteristic adaptations relevant to theistic belief systems and characteristic adaptations that do not require a theistic benefactor.Therefore, in the current study, we sought to expand the understanding of transcendent gratitude by exploring possible theistic and non-theistic predictors or characteristic adaptations at play within varying belief systems.
Convictions and narratives about transcendence help people understand and pursue the things in life that are most meaningful (King et al., 2022;King, Schnitker, et al., 2020;Schnitker et al., 2019).McAdams and Pals (2006) conceptualize personality theory as informed by internalized narratives that serve to direct life by providing unity, purpose, and meaning.Extending this theory, transcendent narrative identities (King, 2020;King et al., in press;Schnitker et al., 2019) capture the orienting power of beyond-the-self narratives imbued with sacred significance.Research indicates that views of the sacred or ultimate have orienting power and can serve to organize entire goal systems (Emmons, 1999), integrate sacred purposes into our identities (Bronk, 2014;Damon, 2008), and give sacred meaning to specific goals, which are then pursued with greater effort and received with more social support (Mahoney et al., 2021).Notably, transcendent sources of gratitude have been found to magnify effects on positive outcomes associated with gratitude (Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023).Yet, prior studies do not seek to understand non-theistic sources of transcendent gratitude.Therefore, there is still much to learn about transcendent sources of gratitude in non-theistic individuals.

Transcendent gratitude
There are qualitatively different types of gratitude, requiring varying levels of socioemotional skills and cognitive appraisals that lead to different outcomes for individuals (Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023).These types of gratitude range from intrapersonal (e.g.gratitude lists), to interpersonal (involving a benefactor), to transcendent (involving a sacred/cosmic or non-human source), to virtuous (involving morally appropriate responses to receiving) (Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023).In the literature, gratitude is most often conceptualized as interpersonal gratitude, which involves thoughts, feelings, and behaviors associated with recognizing the receipt of a benefit and a perception that the benefit is the result of the good intentions of another (McCullough et al., 2002;Tsang, 2006).Thus, interpersonal gratitude has a triadic structure involving a benefit, benefactor, and beneficiary (Manela, 2019).Furthermore, the type of benefactor identified changes the experience of gratitude (Charzyńska, 2020).Interpersonal gratitude is also known as dispositional gratitude, the tendency to regularly recognize benefits and their benefactors in your life (McCullough et al., 2002).
What, then, happens when the perceived benefactor is intangible, like the Universe, Science, Nature, or God?These transcendent targets may or may not be personified but are still targets of gratitude (King et al., 2022;Nelson et al., 2022;Tsang et al., 2021).Emerging research on gratitude to God demonstrates that transcendent gratitude is operational and influential in the lives of believers (e.g.Rosmarin et al., 2011;Tsang et al., 2023).But there is evidence to suggest that transcendent gratitude is not just relevant to theists (King et al., 2022), perhaps because transcendent gratitude combines two deep-seated meaning-making frameworks; gratitude and transcendent narratives (King et al., in press;Schnitker et al., 2019).Gratitude is a meaning-making practice as it helps individuals identify the good things in their life and attribute those good things to the beneficence of others.Additionally, transcendent narratives, among many functions, assign benevolent design to seemingly disparate and uncontrollable events in one's life.Therefore, transcendent gratitude may be a unique meaning-making proclivity that allows individuals to identify good things in their life and assign benevolent intent to a cosmic source.Both are powerful meaningmaking opportunities that can reduce negative affect and magnify positive affect (Nelson et al., 2022).
Therefore, transcendent gratitude may be part of the evolved cognitive systems that guide social and group behavior (Kirkpatrick, 2005).For example, interpersonal or dispositional gratitude may have evolved to signal individual fitness by demonstrating an individual's inclinations towards cooperation and motivations to reciprocate (Emmons & McNamara, 2006;McCullough et al., 2008).In the case of this study, religious or transcendent gratitude may also serve to forge group adherence, belonging, and attachment (Kirkpatrick, 2005).Religions and belief systems that include a transcendent, benevolent giver as part of their narrative support the enactment of the human tendency towards gratitude and reciprocity (Beeler-Duden & Vaish, 2020) by identifying a transcendent giver to express gratitude for gifts that are not attributable to humans.Therefore, if gratitude to transcendent sources does have neurobiological underpinnings, we would expect to see vestiges of this adaptation in nonreligious individuals.In fact, emerging research exploring transcendent gratitude across believers and nonbelievers has found this to be the case (King et al., 2022;White et al., 2022).In the modern era, this proclivity is especially relevant given the rapid decrease in conventional religiosity (Pew Research Center, 2016).To pursue these complexities and conduct more inclusive research, we frame transcendent gratitude as gratitude toward any benevolent, sacred, cosmic, beyondhuman source for perceived benefits.We argue that regardless of one's metaphysics, transcendent gratitude is prompted by the recognition of benefits that cannot plausibly be attributed to human agency, an occurrence that is more common than we might think (King et al., 2022).McAdams and Pals (2006) theory of personality posits that characteristic adaptations are the psychological capacities that enable one to experience and live out one's personality.Such adaptations or psychological habits include motives, goals, strivings, strategies, schemas, internal working models, patterns of regulation, and worldviews.Within a transcendent narrative identity framework, characteristic adaptations are the psychological tendencies that motivate and enable people to experience virtuous feelings such as gratitude and act out their virtuous intentions (King, 2020;Schnitker et al., 2019).In the case of gratitude, they are the psychological capacities that enable individuals to recognize benefits, relate to various benefactors, experience the feelings appropriate to the meaning and value of the benefit, and respond appropriately to benefits (Algoe, 2012;Nelson et al., in press;Tudge et al., 2022).

Characteristic adaptations and transcendent gratitude
Importantly, different narratives about transcendence might be more relevant to different adaptations that lead to gratitude.For example, beliefs about a loving, transcendent benefactor may be more relevant to theists or to those who have a more anthropomorphized conceptualization of a transcendent giver.In contrast, non-theistic adaptations such as prosocial intentions might be better predictors of non-theistic transcendent gratitude.Therefore, the distinction between theistic and non-theistic characteristic adaptations is critical when seeking to understand transcendent gratitude across varied belief systems.

Theistic predictors of transcendent gratitude
The affective experience of gratitude is influenced by four factors: characteristics of the beneficiary, characteristics of the benefactor, characteristics of the benefit, and the relationship between the beneficiary and benefactor (Nelson, Hardy, & Watkins, 2023;Tsang et al., 2021).Therefore, perceptions or beliefs associated with the characteristics of and relationship with the benefactor have particularly interesting implications when considering transcendent targets of gratitude.Previous research highlights a wide variety of responses to gifts from transcendent sources (King et al., 2022;Nelson, Hardy, & Watkins, 2023;Nelson, Hendricks, et al., 2023;Nelson et al., 2022).Yet, to date, most empirical studies of transcendent gratitude do not account for non-theistic transcendent benefactors and how disparate beliefs impact gratitude.Initial research demonstrates that differential patterns of thoughts and attitudes relevant to gratitude are observable when differences in beliefs about the transcendent are taken into account, including those with no clear giver (King et al., 2022).In the gratitude to God literature, beliefs surrounding the character of God and the relationship between the believer and God impacts outcomes associated with gratitude.For example, when God is viewed as more comforting and loving, individuals report higher levels of gratitude to God (Krause et al., 2015).
Several other potential predictors of transcendent gratitude have been identified in the literature.For example, secure attachment to God, proximity to God (i.e.interaction with the divine), and transcendent (i.e.positive) indebtedness to God all predict enhanced outcomes and magnified gratitude experiences (Nelson, Hardy, & Watkins, 2023;Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023).Fidelity to beliefs predicts virtues such as hope and thus may predict transcendent gratitude (King, Vaughn, et al., 2020).Moreover, conceptions and beliefs about intangible benefactors (e.g.does it have a mind; White et al., 2022), construal level (e.g.how abstract they are; Tsang et al., 2021), and accessibility (how easily they come to mind; Nelson et al., 2022) have all been found to influence gratitude.Taken together, emerging research provides a compelling case that characteristic adaptations related to transcendent benefactors can have a profound impact on gratitude experiences.Specifically, we anticipate that predictors associated with the benefactor, such as attitudes, fidelity to beliefs, interaction, attachment, and transcendent indebtedness, will influence transcendent gratitude more than dispositional gratitude.

Non-theistic predictors of transcendent gratitude
In addition to predictors associated with the benefactor, other non-theistic characteristic adaptations may also predict transcendent gratitude experiences.Nontheistic characteristic adaptations may be especially relevant to understanding the phenomenology of nontheistic transcendent gratitude.Returning to McAdams and Pals (2006) theory of personality, narrative identity is lived out through characteristic adaptations.Therefore, characteristic adaptations that influence non-theistic narrative identities might be most applicable to nontheists.
For example, a primal belief in the goodness of the world is theorized to be a necessary condition for transcendent gratitude in non-theistic worldviews (Cohoe, 2022).Indeed, research confirms that primal beliefs which describe the world as enticing, abundant, and alive positively correlate with gratitude (Clifton et al., 2019) and that having a sense that life is meaningful and comprehensible (i.e. that it makes sense) predicts well-being and gratitude (George & Park, 2016;Russo-Netzer, 2019).Prosocial tendencies are also associated with transcendent gratitude (Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023).In short, understanding which characteristic adaptations, or psychological tendencies, are most relevant for transcendent gratitude may provide insight into interventions that foster transcendent gratitude in people with diverse belief systems.Therefore, in this study, we included non-theistic characteristic adaptations that may shape transcendent gratitude.Given the existing literature, we anticipated that characteristic adaptations that are relevant to diverse worldviews, such as life comprehension, primal beliefs, prosocial intentions, and general attachment style, will be significant predictors of transcendent gratitude for non-theists.

Dispositional gratitude across belief systems
As previously outlined, there is reason to believe that transcendent gratitude is a universal tendency and will be present even in non-theists.However, given the reality of diverse belief systems, it is important to compare transcendent gratitude with dispositional gratitude in non-theists.For this reason, we included dispositional gratitude as a contrast to transcendent gratitude.We posit that there are a variety of potential characteristic adaptations (theistic and non-theistic) associated with both transcendent and dispositional gratitude.Not all belief systems share the same metaphysics; not all persons recognize the existence of an immaterial essence or benevolent benefactor that may be given causal attribution for benefits and personified like God.Some belief systems acknowledge different laws (e.g.karma), forces (e.g.life essence), or sources (e.g.nature) that are less apt to be conceptualized as emanating from an intentional, benevolent, and/or agentic source.Nonetheless, these belief systems have been found to affect the experience of gratitude (White et al., 2022).Furthermore, in some cases, people may not recognize any source or giver, but they still possess the cognitive attributions and behavioral appraisals associated with transcendent gratitude, such as reciprocity via prosocial intentions, suggesting that while humans may have neurobiological tendencies towards transcendent gratitude, the language of non-theistic adaptations may be more accessible for certain belief systems (King et al., 2022).Furthermore, we hypothesize that non-theistic adaptations will be better predictors of dispositional gratitude than the theistic predictors.

The current study
In order to address this gap in the literature, we designed a large cross-sectional study to complement prior qualitative work exploring the novel construct of transcendent gratitude (King et al., 2022).A crosssectional design was a logical and critical next step to answer foundational questions about the predictors of transcendent gratitude.Cross-sectional studies are important in the early stages of construct development because they allow for efficient sampling of preliminary data of many variables, allow researchers to understand associations between variables, and, most importantly, lay a proper evidence base (Carlson & Morrison, 2009) before launching into more complicated methods and questions that should not come until later stages of research (Wang & Cheng, 2020).
Importantly, our unique contribution to this emerging research area is to include diverse belief systems that represent recent shifts in religious and spiritual affiliation (Smith, 2021).Specifically, we aimed to better understand transcendent gratitude across three broad belief systems, Theistic (e.g.belief in God or gods), Spiritual not theistic (e.g.belief in a life essence, ancestors), and Other belief categories (e.g.belief in science, golden rule).Then, we aimed to understand characteristic adaptations that predict transcendent and dispositional gratitude.First, we explored beliefs, attitudes, interactions, and relationships with self-identified transcendent benefactors.Specifically, we included attitudes towards the benefactor, fidelity to one's transcendent beliefs, the frequency of interaction with a transcendent benefactor, attachment to the transcendent source, and transcendent indebtedness.Next, we investigated predictors that were conceptually independent of anthropomorphized sources of benefits, focusing on nontheistic predictors such as general beliefs about the world and one's general relational tendencies.Specifically, we had the following predictions: Hypothesis 1: All participants would report some levels of transcendent gratitude, but Theists and Spirituals would report the most transcendent gratitude.
Hypothesis 2: Theistic predictors associated with the transcendent benefactor, such as attitudes, fidelity to beliefs, interaction, attachment to God, and transcendent indebtedness, will influence transcendent gratitude more than dispositional gratitude.
Hypothesis 3: Non-theistic adaptations such as comprehension of one's life, primal beliefs about the world, prosocial intentions, and interpersonal attachment style will predict dispositional gratitude more than transcendent gratitude.
Hypothesis 4: Characteristic adaptations that are relevant to diverse worldviews, such as life comprehension, primal beliefs, prosocial intentions, and general attachment style, will be significant predictors of transcendent gratitude for non-theists.

Participants
For our study, participation was limited to Prolific users who were U.S. residents, 18 years of age or older, could read and understand English, and had internet access.The age of the 619 participants ranged from 18 to 84 (M age 37.5; SD = 13.6).Our sample was 52.6% female, with 56.3% of participants identifying as white, 11.6% identifying as Black, 11.9% identifying as Asian, 11.4% identifying as Latinx, and 9% identifying as either a different race from those listed or multi-racial.Of the three belief categories included in this study, 38.4% of participants identified as Theistic, 26.4% identified as Spiritual (but not theistic), and 35.2% identified as 'Other' or as not fitting into either of the previous belief categories.

Procedures
Before recruiting participants, this study was evaluated and approved by Fuller Theological Seminary's Institutional Review Board (IRB #1679819-1).We recruited participants through the crowd-sourcing platform, Prolific.Compared to convenience samples, such as college undergrads, crowd-sourcing samples have been found to be more representative of the general population (Buhrmester et al., 2011).Additionally, recent research indicates that Prolific offers the best data quality of all crowd-sourcing platforms available at the time of data collection (Peer et al., 2022).We paid workers $4.40, and the median completion time was 16.04 minutes.To capture ethnic and racial diversity in the United States, we recruited participants as close as possible to a representative .sample.To accomplish this, we paused data collection twice to monitor demographics and to adjust our demographic recruitment needs using an option provided by Prolific.The study was advertised on Prolific as a 20-minute survey on worldviews and beliefs.After obtaining consent, participants completed the survey online with the scales presented in random order.All participants were shown all scales, but the order of presentation was counterbalanced to minimize potential order effects.

Belief system classification and word replacement strategy
Participants were instructed to write out a short description of the belief system that guides their life (see Appendix A for further descriptions of the belief system classifications).Given that many existing scales that assess constructs related to transcendent, cosmic, or divine sources use the word 'God', a word replacement strategy was necessary to help capture belief systems beyond God.Thus, after describing their beliefs, participants chose one word to summarize their belief system (e.g.God, Ancestors, Science).This word was then used to personalize any scales that asked questions about a transcendent giver/source.Our dependent variable (transcendent gratitude) and all scales in model 1 used this word replacement strategy.All scales in model 2, as well as dispositional gratitude, were unmodified (did not use word replacement).
To classify each participant into one of our three belief categories: Theistic, Spiritual but not theistic, or Other, participants were asked to self-select into a group based on the following descriptions: (1) 'Theistic (belief in one or multiple Gods)', (2) 'Non-theistic but spiritual (belief in a higher power such as the universe, karma, or mother earth -but this belief is NOT related to a specific God)', (3) "Other: Your beliefs are neither theist nor spiritual (for instance, someone who identifies as atheist and non-spiritual), and (4) 'Something else (please specify)'.All participants who chose "something else'' were re-coded into one of the three other categories based on their written descriptions of beliefs.If participants mentioned any God-like source, they were coded as Theistic.If participants mentioned a spiritual force but did not endorse an anthropomorphized god, they were coded as Spiritual.If participants indicated their belief system neither included a god nor a spiritual force, they were coded as Other.

Dependent variables
Transcendent gratitude.To capture transcendent gratitude, we administered the 10-item Trait Gratitude to God scale (GTG-T; Watkins et al., 2019).Participants rated their agreement with statements using a 10-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 10 = strongly agree).Sample items include '___ has given me an overwhelming number of blessings in my life' and 'When I think of what others have done for me in my life, it makes me appreciate ___ even more'.In this study, this scale showed excellent internal reliability at .93.Dispositional gratitude..We administered the 3-item Gratitude Adjective Checklist (GAC; Emmons & McCullough, 2003), which measures the amount of grateful feelings regularly felt in daily life.Participants rated the degree to which they experienced each emotion using a 10-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 10 = a lot).Sample questions include asking participants how often they felt thankful or appreciative.In this study, this scale showed an internal reliability of .97.

Independent variables: theistic predictors
Attitudes toward benefactor.We used the 9-item Attitudes Toward God Scale (Wood et al., 2010) to measure participants' attitudes toward their intangible benefactor.This measure assesses feelings of comfort associated with ___ and feelings of anger toward___.Participants rated how much they agreed or disagreed on a 10-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 10 = strongly agree) to items such as: 'I feel supported by ___' and 'I feel that __ has let me down'.In this study, Cronbach's alphas were both excellent (comfort α = .92;anger α = .87).

Fidelity.
To measure commitment and integration of one's beliefs, we used the Fidelity subscale from the Measurement of Diverse Adolescent Spirituality -Revised (King et al., 2021).Participants indicated how true each statement was in their lives with a 10-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (not true in my life) to 10 (almost always true in my life).Sample items include: '___ defines the way I see the world' and 'I try to incorporate ___ in every aspect of my life'.In this study, the internal reliability of this scale was .53.
Interaction.We asked a single question to elicit information about how often each participant interacts with their transcendent benefactor.We asked: 'Some people engage in activities that relate to their belief system.For example, some people may pray, meditate, study a religious text, read tarot cards, attend a religious or spiritual service group, spend time in nature, write, honor or communicate with their ancestors, etc.How often do YOU engage in any kind of activity that directly relates to ___?' Attachment to benefactor.To capture how attached participants felt towards their transcendent benefactor, we administered the 9-item Attachment to God Scale (Rowatt & Kirkpatrick, 2002) with word replacement.The measure includes Anxious and Avoidant subscales.Participants rated their extent of agreement with statements using a 10-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 10 = strongly agree).Sample items for each subscale include: '___ seems to have little or no interest in my personal problems' (Avoidance) and '___ sometimes seems responsive to my needs, but sometimes not' (Anxiety).Both subscales demonstrated good internal consistency (Avoidance α = .83,Anxiety α = .83).
Transcendent indebtedness.To measure how positively indebted participants felt towards their transcendent benefactor, using a word replacement strategy, we administered the 6-item Transcendent Indebtedness to God Scale (Nelson et al., 2022).Participants rated how much they agreed with statements on a Likert scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 10 (strongly agree).A sample item includes 'I owe __ for my life'.Cronbach's alpha was .92.

Independent variables: non-theistic predictors
Life comprehension.To capture how much sense par- ticipants could make of their lives in general, we administered the 5-item Comprehension subscale of the Multidimensional Existential Meaning Scale (George & Park, 2016).While the overall scale measures an individual's sense of meaning in their lives, the comprehension subscale specifically measures the degree to which individuals' beliefs about their life make sense to them.Participants rated how much they agreed or disagreed on a 10-point Likert scale (1 = I strongly disagree, 10 = I strongly agree with the statement).Sample items for the Comprehension subscale include: 'I know what my life is about' and 'I can make sense of the things that happen in my life'.In this study, this scale showed a high level of reliability (α=.96).

Primal beliefs.
To assess participants' fundamental beliefs about the world as a whole, we administered the Primals Inventory Short Form (Clifton et al., 2019).This modified 6-item version of the 99-item full measure has been recommended for clinical and research use (Clifton & Yaden, 2021).Participants rated items on a 10point Likert scale, ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 10 = strongly agree.Sample items include 'Most things in the world are good' and 'In life, there's way more beauty than ugliness'.In our study, the internal reliability of this 6-item scale was excellent (.90).

Prosociality.
To measure participants' level of prosocial intentions, we administered the 4-item Prosocial Behavioral Intentions Scale (Baumsteiger & Siegel, 2019), which measures intentions of prosociality in the world.Participants rated the likelihood of behavior on a 10point Likert Scale ranging from 1 (Definitely would not do this) to 10 (Definitely would do this).Sample items include 'Comfort someone I know after they experience a hardship' and 'Help care for a sick friend or relative'.In this study, this scale had good reliability (α=.84).

Interpersonal attachment style.
To assess interpersonal attachment style, we administered the 9-item Experiences in Close Relationships -Revised Scale (ECR-RS; Fraley et al., 2011), which is designed to assess relationship-specific attachment.For this study, we administered a questionnaire focused on the relationship with a best friend.Participants rated how much they agreed with statements using a 10-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 10 = strongly agree).Sample questions include 'I often worry that my best friend doesn't really care for me'.and 'I'm afraid that my best friend may abandon me'.The Cronbach's alpha for this scale was .91.

Additional variables measured
Demographics.At the end of the study, participants reported their gender, age, and race/ethnicity.Attention check.To ensure participants were paying attention while taking their survey, two methods of checking attention were used.Including attention check items is a common strategy for verifying data quality (Berinsky et al., 2014).First, we embedded one question in the interpersonal attachment scale, which asked participants to 'Please select "neutral" for this question so we can verify you're reading these statements closely :)'.Additionally, at the end of the study, we asked participants, 'One last question!We promise this will not impact your compensation, this is simply to help us understand our data as best we can.How much attention did you pay to this survey as you were taking it?' with options ranging from 'I paid attention the whole time' to 'I wasn't really paying attention'.

Preliminary analysis and data screening
Of the initial 626 participants who completed the study, four failed an attention check question, and three participants did not provide complete data and were removed from all analyses.This left 619 participants for all analyses.To make our results more interpretable across different measurement scales, we transformed all variables to z-scores.We cleaned the data in SPSS (version 26), and all analyses were run in R (version 4.2.1 patched).

Path model 1: theistic predictors of gratitude
A first set of path analyses was conducted to investigate the relationships between theistic characteristic adaptations and the two dependent variables: transcendent gratitude and dispositional gratitude.The scales all employed word replacement.Overall, participants who reported more transcendent gratitude were older, b* = 0.04, p = .039,and viewed their benefactor as more lov- A second set of multigroup path analyses investigated how the relationships between theistic predictors and the gratitude variables may differ based on participants' self-selected groups.A chi-square difference test showed that a group where all paths were allowed to vary had better model fit, χ 2 (0) = 0.00, p = 1.00,Robust CFI = 1.00,Robust RMSEA = 0.00, SRMR = 0.00, than a model where regression paths and intercepts were constrained to be equal across groups, χ 2 (36) = 61.75,p = .005,Robust CFI = .97,Robust RMSEA = .06,90% CI [.03, .09],SRMR = 0.03, ∆χ 2 (36) = 61.75,p = .005.Table 1 shows the relationships between transcendent benefactororiented predictors and transcendent gratitude by selfselected groups. 1 The very high R 2 values across the belief groups suggest that these adaptations strongly contribute to transcendent gratitude.The Theist and Other groups demonstrated similar pathways, with transcendent indebtedness and views of a comforting giver being the strongest predictors, with a less angry giver also contributing significantly but to a lesser extent.Transcendent indebtedness was also the strongest contributor for the Spiritual group.However, unlike the other two belief groups, being less angry, being less avoidant, and being more anxious were important contributors to transcendent gratitude for the Spiritual group.
The overall effect size of the path models across the belief groups for dispositional gratitude was moderate, suggesting that transcendent gratitude is not congruent with dispositional gratitude across the groups when considering these benefactor-oriented adaptations.The Theistic group reported higher levels of dispositional gratitude than the Spiritual or Other groups, and each group reflected a different path.In sum, the relationship between the benefactor-oriented predictors and both transcendent and dispositional gratitude differ by belief groups, with the exception of anger (negative association) and indebtedness (positive association), which are significant predictors across belief systems predicting transcendent gratitude.In sum, the relationship between the benefactor-oriented predictors and both transcendent and dispositional gratitude differ by belief groups.

Path model 2: non-theistic predictors of gratitude
A second set of path analyses were conducted to investigate the relationships between the non-theistic predictors and the dependent variables: transcendent gratitude and dispositional gratitude.An overall path model that investigated relationships across all participants found that participants reported more gratitude towards a transcendent benefactor when they were older, b* = 0.07, p = .046,had higher life comprehension, b* = .26,p < .001,had higher positive primal beliefs, b* = 0.22, p < .001,and had higher prosocial intentions, b* = 0.22, p < .001.Participants' attachment anxiety was unrelated to transcendent gratitude, b* = −0.01,p = .933.Concurrently, participants reported more dispositional gratitude when they had more life comprehension, b* = 0.38, p < .001,more positive primal beliefs, b* = 0.16, p < .001,more prosocial behavioral intentions, b* = 0.14, p = .001,and less attachment anxiety, b* = −0.11,p = .008.There was no relationship between participants' age and dispositional gratitude, b* = −0.01,p = .772.An additional set of multigroup path analyses investigated how the relationships between the non-theistic predictors and the two types of gratitude may differ based on participants' self-selected groups.A chisquare difference test showed that a group where all paths were allowed to vary had better model fit, χ 2 (0) = 0.00, p = 1.00,Robust CFI = 1.00,Robust RMSEA = 0.00, SRMR = 0.00, than a model where regression paths and intercepts were constrained to be equal across groups, χ 2 (24) = 128.16,p < .001,Robust CFI = .80,Robust RMSEA = .15,90% CI [.12, .17],SRMR = 0.09, ∆χ 2 (24) = 128.16,p < .001.Table 2 shows the relationships between nontheistic predictors and the two measures of gratitude across the belief categories.
Overall, the relationship between the non-theistic predictors and both transcendent gratitude and dispositional gratitude differed by participants' self-selected groups.For transcendent gratitude, these general variables explained almost the same amount of variance for Theistic (R 2 = .35)and Spiritual (R 2 = .32)groups (and less variance for Other, R 2 = .18),but for dispositional gratitude, they explained the same amount of variance for Spiritual (R 2 = .19)and Other (R 2 = .19)and more so for Theistic (R 2 = .41).All groups had the same three most influential predictors in common, but the predictor that contributed the most varied by group: for the Theistic, life comprehension; for the Spirituals, primal beliefs; and for the Other, prosocial intentions.Unlike the other two groups, whose path models pointed to beliefs about one's life or the world as the strongest predictors, for the Other group, such beliefs or concerns were either not significant or only marginally contributed to transcendent gratitude, whereas having prosocial intentions was most prominent.For all three belief categories, life comprehension was the most influential for dispositional gratitude, with primal beliefs being second for Theistic and for Others, and prosociality being second for Spiritual.Higher levels of secure attachment were also significant for the Theistic group.
We then used structural equation modeling to compare the relationships between the two sets of predictors and transcendent and dispositional gratitude.A chisquare difference test showed that a group where all paths were allowed to vary had better model fit, χ 2 (27) = 48.77,p = .006,Robust CFI = .99Robust RMSEA = .06,90% CI [.03, .09],SRMR = .06,than a model where regression (20) = 45.13,p = .001.Table 3 shows the relationships between the theistic and non-theistic variables and the two forms of gratitude controlling for the self-selected belief category.Each belief group functioned uniquely with regard to transcendent gratitude and dispositional gratitude.Yet, overall, as hypothesized, theistic factors better predicted transcendent gratitude and nontheistic factors better predicted dispositional gratitude.

Discussion
Though researchers have explored the many benefits of a grateful life over the past several decades (Portocarrero et al., 2020), transcendent sources (e.g.God, Ancestors, and Science) have been neglected in comparison to interpersonal targets of gratitude.Given the orienting power of transcendent narrative identities (King, 2020;King et al., in press;Schnitker et al., 2019) to help organize entire goal systems (Emmons, 1999), it is vital to continue to explore how constructs such as gratitude function when experienced transcendently, and through the lens of various belief systems.This is especially important because research has found that individuals commonly express gratitude for things not directly attributable to human agency (King et al., 2022;Nelson, Hardy, & Watkins, 2023).Moreover, the modern movement away from traditional religious beliefs (Smith, 2021) calls into question the homogeneous treatment of beliefs within the literature.To address these complexities, we investigated different patterns of characteristic adaptations that predict transcendent and dispositional gratitude across varied belief systems.Indeed, our novel contribution to the emerging gratitude to God literature is the inclusion of diverse belief systems that are more representative of beliefs in the (Smith, 2021).Specifically, we included three broad belief groups, Theistic (e.g.belief in God or gods), Spiritual not theistic (e.g.belief in a life essence, ancestors), and Other belief categories (e.g.belief in science, golden rule).We found support for our hypothesis that all groups experience transcendent gratitude, with Theists and Spirituals experiencing the most transcendent gratitude.Interestingly, results from two ANCOVAs, first predicting transcendent gratitude and then predicting dispositional gratitude, revealed that Theists reported the highest levels of both types of gratitude.This finding is consistent with prior work connecting religious commitment with higher levels of gratitude (Rosmarin et al., 2011).
Next, we aimed to understand how theistic adaptations would predict gratitude.Specifically, we investigated attitudes, fidelity, interaction, attachment, and transcendent indebtedness to the transcendent source.We found support that adaptations connected to the transcendent benefactor were better predictors of transcendent gratitude than dispositional gratitude.Of particular interest is the positive association between transcendent indebtedness and gratitude and the negative association with anger, which were both robust predictors of transcendent gratitude across belief systems.Prior research has found a strong link between transcendent indebtedness and gratitude (Nelson, Hardy, & Watkins, 2023;Nelson, Hardy, Tice, et al., 2023), suggesting that positive indebtedness plays an important role in understanding gratitude, especially in interpersonal and transcendent forms of gratitude where a benefactor is recognized.Furthermore, previous research has found that anger toward God predicts spiritual struggles, which negatively impacts well-being (Exline et al., 2021).Anger towards transcendent sources may have a similar association with well-being.Future research should seek to understand the interactions of anger, gratitude, and spiritual struggles with transcendent sources to better understand their relationship to psychological well-being.
Next, we assessed non-theistic predictors of gratitude to include language that might be more accessible to non-theists where benefactor-oriented items may have caused confusion (e.g.does anger towards science make sense?).We used a word replacement strategy to allow for language that reflects varied beliefs.Interestingly, a multigroup confirmatory factor analysis revealed that the theistic items and the non-theistic items showed invariance across belief groups.In other words, this provided evidence that the items were capturing similar latent constructs across groups.Furthermore, a superordinate factor consisting of the two most significant predictors, comfort and indebtedness, emerged from the theistic items.Similarly, a superordinate factor consisting of life comprehension and primal beliefs emerged from the non-theistic items.Nevertheless, when controlling for the belief category, the theistic items were better predictors of transcendent gratitude, and the non-theistic items were better predictors of dispositional gratitude.This suggests that future research on transcendent gratitude should attend to these different belief categories and use the appropriate predictors.
Finally, we found that comprehension of one's life, primal beliefs about the world, prosocial intentions, and interpersonal attachment style predicted dispositional gratitude better than transcendent gratitude.This finding is similar to previous work comparing dispositional gratitude and gratitude to God (Rosmarin et al., 2011).We also found support for our hypothesis that nontheistic adaptations would better predict gratitude than theistic adaptations for those with less anthropomorphized benefactors.Given that transcendent gratitude is a new concept, we had no specific hypotheses related to which beliefs or worldviews would be most relevant for each belief category.
Overall, the results of this study indicate that belief systems matter when predicting gratitude, providing evidence that beliefs influence the psychological pathways that lead to experiences of transcendent gratitude.More specifically, our results highlight that people access transcendent gratitude differently than they do dispositional gratitude, as evidenced by the different characteristic adaptations variably predicting the two types of gratitude.Finally, these findings suggest that treating these three belief groups as equivalent may not be appropriate, as each group showed marked differences in the characteristic adaptations associated with experiences of transcendent gratitude.More granular findings across belief groups are discussed in Online Supplemental Materials.

Overall findings
Our final analyses examined the two most significant characteristic adaptations from the two types of predictors (theistic and non-theistic) to determine the extent of influence on transcendent gratitude.The results indicate that across belief groups, perceptions of a benefactor as comforting and having a sense of indebtedness towards a benefactor were stronger pathways to transcendent gratitude than one's beliefs about the world and life.That said, while the non-theistic predictors were not significant for the Theistic and Other groups, they were significant for the Spiritual group.Given that people who identify as spiritual but not religious often hold beliefs about the natural and/or moral order (Ammerman, 2013), it makes sense that their general belief variables contributed to transcendent gratitude.In summary, across the belief categories having positive views towards one's benefactor -experiencing the benefactor as comforting and feeling joyfully indebted toward the benefactor, predict higher levels of transcendent gratitude.For people who identify as Other, prosocial tendencies appear to be significant predictors of transcendent gratitude.

Limitations and future research
First, this cross-sectional data was a critical first step to providing a base of evidence to initiate this novel research investigating transcendent gratitude across diverse belief systems, but more sophisticated methods are needed to answer the questions that remain.For instance, why is it significant for the Theists and Others to believe in a loving benefactor but not significant for the Spirituals?Additionally, why is an angry benefactor more significant for Spirituals and less so for Theists and Others?Throughout our discussion, we offer possible theoretical explanations for some of our findings, but experimental and longitudinal studies are needed to assess questions pertaining to causality, temporal ordering, and interactions among key variables.
Other limitations to consider when interpreting these results include the self-report bias inherent in observational survey measures.In addition, transcendent gratitude is a novel construct, so while this research is important, it should be considered preliminary and needs to be replicated.Particularly, it is important to replicate these findings in regions other than the U.S. Another limitation of this research may be the belief-specific word replacement strategy we used to modify scales originally intended to measure beliefs towards God.Substituting a word to replace 'God' might not always be appropriate and might actually be confusing for some groups.For example, 'I view science as unkind' might confuse participants who do not view science as being an agentic entity (White et al., 2022).Nevertheless, sensitivity to belief diversity is crucial to achieving accurate measurement of constructs that tap into transcendent beliefs.Future researchers should continue to improve upon this word-replacement strategy or find other ways to measure non-theistic beliefs as they are beginning to become more common in the population.

Conclusion
Beliefs profoundly shape gratitude and are simultaneously becoming increasingly diverse.Therefore, sensitivity to these different belief systems is critical.Indeed beliefs alter our experiences with the world, including our experiences of transcendent gratitude.Notably, we found that whether people thank God, acknowledge the universe, attribute gifts to karma, or do not consider where their benefits originate from, people from all belief systems experience transcendent gratitude.Moreover, our study included a novel measurement of transcendent indebtedness to predict transcendent gratitude.We found a robust relationship between transcendent gratitude and this positive form of indebtedness -feeling a sense of indebtedness that is prompted by delight rather than duty.Other important predictors of transcendent gratitude included believing in a more comforting and less angry benefactor and viewing the world as beautiful, good, and optimistic.Those who make sense of their world and act prosocially towards others are more likely to feel transcendent gratitude; this is especially true for nontheists.Thus, our findings contribute novel insights into the experience of transcendent gratitude in individuals with diverse beliefs and begin to shed light on how more people may experience transcendent gratitude.

Note
1.An alternative explanation for the high R 2 values may be that the word-replacement method used for transcendent benefactor-oriented predictor variables may have introduced a common method bias.A confirmatory factor analysis using a robust maximum likelihood estimation where all transcendent variables (except age) loaded onto one overall factor showed poor model fit, χ2 (14) = 221.72,p < .001,Robust CFI = .85,Robust RMSEA = .17,90% CI [.15, .19],SRMR = .10.This result was interpreted as not supporting the presence of common method bias within the transcendent predictor variables.

Table 1 .
Theistic predictors of gratitude by category of belief systems.
Note: These are standardized regression weights.Bolded variables indicate p < .05.

Table 2 .
Non-theistic Predictors of Gratitude.These are standardized regression weights.Bolded variables indicate p < .05.

Table 3 .
Combined Transcendent Predictors of Gratitude.These are standardized regression weights.Bolded variables indicate p < .05.