Gratitude expressions have received growing attention from scholars, with research emphasizing its many positive effects on expressers, recipients, and witnesses. Although our knowledge of gratitude expressions' benefits is accumulating, our understanding of its limits is less developed. In this article, we ask when employees' expressions of gratitude toward their leaders positively influence witnesses' perceptions of them, and when they do not. Across three studies including two multiwave surveys and an experiment, we find that expressed gratitude strengthens witnesses' perceptions of expressers' prosocial identities, especially when the leader is believed to be deserving of gratitude. Study 1 examines leader competence as an indicator of deservingness in a sample of leaders and employees in a manufacturing context. Studies 2 and 3 use survey and experimental methods to directly establish leader deservingness as a mechanism of the competence moderator and explore warmth as an additional component of employees' deservingness perceptions. All three studies show how gratitude expression ultimately shapes witnesses' tendencies to help expressers and seek feedback from them. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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他们不值得你感谢！见证对领导指导的感激之情的反应。


感恩的表达越来越受到学者们的关注，研究强调它对表达者、接受者和见证者有许多积极的影响。尽管我们对表达感激之情的好处的认识不断积累，但对其局限性的理解还不够深入。在本文中，我们询问员工对领导者表达的感激之情何时会积极影响目击者对他们的看法，何时不会。在包括两项多波调查和一项实验在内的三项研究中，我们发现表达的感激之情增强了目击者对表达者亲社会身份的看法，尤其是当领导者被认为值得感激时。研究 1 检查了领导者能力，将其作为制造业环境中领导者和员工样本中应得的指标。研究2和3使用调查和实验方法直接建立领导者应得性作为能力调节器的机制，并探索温暖作为员工应得性感知的附加组成部分。所有三项研究都表明，感激之情的表达如何最终塑造目击者帮助表达者并寻求他们反馈的倾向。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2024 APA，保留所有权利）。