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We feel gratitude—a positive emotion upon receiving an undeserved benefit which is attributable to the givers’ benevolent intent (Watkins, 2007, 2014). Meanwhile, indebtedness symbolises an unpleasant mental state which is also triggered by benefit receipts (Greenberg, 1980). Theories and empirical evidence in the literature have highlighted how gratitude and indebtedness each relates to prosociality (or sanctioning), and importantly, how via different routes these two constructs will elicit cooperativeness. Nonetheless, there is still a gap in the literature on how gratitude and indebtedness will contribute to prosociality and sanctioning in economic exchanges (Leung, 2011). Thus via three economic games (i.e. Experiments 1 to 3, presented in Chapters 2 to 5) I endeavour to thoroughly examine how gratitude (and indebtedness) would relate to prosociality or sanctioning in a Behavioural Economics context. In so doing I intend to combine Psychometrics and Experimental Economics in the examination of the gratitude (and indebtedness)-prosociality association. Additionally, via meta-analysing (i.e. Chapter 2) over three decades of research on the gratitude-prosociality link I intend to offer i) a comprehensive quantitative synthesis of the findings and, ii) a systematic exploration of moderators, which are both absent in the literature. The present thesis also features a series of extensive follow-up analyses on an interesting economic observation from Experiment 1— i.e. the cheap-rider problem (Cornes & Sandler, 1984). While Experiment 2 entails a more focused scrutiny (via a one-shot game) over the occurrences and motives behind cheap-riding, Experiment 3 builds on that by testing how cheap-riding may be used to enforce normative fairness in an iterated exchange context. Results of the meta-analysis revealed a moderate positive link between gratitude and prosociality. The moderator analyses showed that this link is stronger when, a) state rather than trait gratitude was measured, b) direct instead of indirect or non-reciprocal outcomes was examined, and c) benefit-triggered instead of generalized gratitude (Lambert et al., 2009) was examined. Meanwhile, results of Experiment 1 built upon the above by showing how the gratitude-reciprocity link will be subject to helper intent attribution, and how the injunctive fairness norm (Elster, 2006) could influence this attribution and thereby shaped recipients’ feeling of gratitude (or indebtedness) throughout the episode, and ultimately his/her urge to directly reciprocate. Additionally, a noticeable degree of cheap-riding was observed when unfairly treated participants were granted an avenue to sanction their helpers. The data of Experiment 2 revealed a pattern of cheap-riding that corresponded not only to that of Experiment 1 but also to the reality. Crucially, the analyses of the motives behind repayment allowed the disentanglement of the psychology between that of the cheap-riders, cooperators, and free-riders. Lastly, analyses of Experiment 3 revealed three main findings. They included, a) people’s preference for an ‘optimal’ platform for cheap-riding to better serve its norm-enforcing function, although its actual efficacy in promoting mutual compliance to normative fairness is still questionable; b) how the Relative Rank Model of Gratitude (Wood, Brown, & Maltby, 2011) will supersede the injunctive fairness norm in guiding the recipients’ benefit appraisals, experienced gratitude, and eventual direct reciprocal acts toward the helpers; and c) how gratitude and indebtedness were both predictive of more trustworthiness and generosity in an iterated, variant of Trust Game.

This exploratory, psycho-social study examined young people’s reflections on their experiences of engaging with a youth offending service (YOS). There is a paucity of research that explores this. Five participants were recruited from a YOS in the UK. Free association techniques were used; five participants were interviewed using the Grid Elaboration Method, four were interviewed again using the Free-Association Narrative Interview. Interview transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis, a psycho-social lens was then applied and ‘scenic understandings’ composed for each participant. The thematic analysis illuminated four themes: transformative relationship with YOT worker: identity transformation: engaging: then’s presence in now. Themes and ‘scenic understandings’ were drawn upon in discussion of links to literature, navigated as: trust in relationships; past and present, developing an identity distanced from a past self, engagement in personalised intervention, the function and structure of YOS, YOS engagement; a window of opportunity, developing a psycho-social understanding of what participants talked about. Strengths of the study lie in the psycho-social approach and free association method of data collection, enabling rich descriptions and interpretations that considered the interrelatedness of psychological and social experiences. Potential implications for practice were highlighted; 1. consideration of what participants talked about by professionals working in YOS and with similar populations, 2. consideration of the development of the EP role, such as providing supervisory support to reflect on the psycho-social needs of young people engaging with YOS, 3. maintenance and development of the focus of YOS procedures such as emphasising the importance of building meaningful relationships and providing structure for young people engaging with YOS. Recommendations for future research are; 1. undertaking similar studies with young people having difficulty with engagement, 2. investigating both young people’s and their YOT worker’s experiences of working together to develop understanding of the intersubjective nature of the engagement process.