Users’ Gratitude as a source of support for Social-Health Operators: First validation of the Perceived Gratitude Scale (PGrate)

The theme of feeling gratitude and its possible role in buffering stress has been widely explored in the Positive Psychology approach. However almost nothing has been said about users’ gratitude and its plausible function as a source of support for social-health professionals. With the aim of measuring the support derived from the professionals’ perception of users’ gratitude, a scale was developed and administered to 347 social operators. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was conducted in order to validate scale structure and analyze items properties. Scale reliability and discriminant validity were evaluated by Cronbach’s alpha, AVE and correlations with divergent construct. A two-factor solution was highlighted: Gratitude expressions and Gratitude as a source of support (3 and 5 items). The work contributes to fill a gap in the reflection on the positive side of the relationship with users: the new PGrate scale can be considered to evaluate this particular source of support, in addition to the traditional social support received from colleagues and superiors.