Grateful attitude good for health, happiness

In the midst of end-of-the-semester madness and with finals just around the corner, many can already taste the turkey and hotly anticipate Thanksgiving break next week.

But aside from near-toxic levels of tryptophan and football frenzy, there might be a few more reasons to be thankful this holiday season.

Dr. Jo-Ann Tsang, assistant professor of psychology and neuroscience, has done extensive research on gratitude and found grateful people are more forgiving, positive, have higher life satisfaction, and exhibit lower levels of anxiety, depression and envy.

"A number of experiments have shown that after writing about gratitude, individuals feel more mentally healthy," she said. "Individuals who engaged in a gratitude exercise showed significant increases in their experiences of positive emotion."

That effect was strongest, she said, in individuals who were instructed to think about another individual for whom they were grateful. Tsang also said research suggests writing down things which one is grateful for increases psychological and possibly even physical health.

People who experience gratitude more often tend to pray, read Scripture and attend religious activities more often than those who do not.

They also report having a closer relationship to God, Tsang said, but gratitude is not confined to any specific culture, religion or denomination.

"Every human being, regardless of their faith, can feel gratitude and thanks for what they have, no matter who they're giving thanks to," Dallas senior Hoda Said said.

Said is a Muslim, but she said her family always celebrates Thanksgiving the traditional way.

In fact, she said her family's celebration is probably closer to an original Thanksgiving because there's always a mix of American and Arabic foods like the meal the pilgrims shared with the Native Americans.

"(My family) never gets to spend quality time together, so Thanksgiving is really important to us," she said.

On the other hand, Said explained that for Muslims, gratitude is something to be expressed daily, a part of the five daily prayers known as Al-Fatiha.

The beginning words to this prayer mean "all thanks be to God."

"Everything we have is a gift from God. Thanking God (daily) is a part of worshipping," she said.

Krupali Patel didn't grow up celebrating Thanksgiving. She's from Ndola, Zambia, and she is Hindu. She said in her religion, Diwali, or the Festival of Lights, is the closest thing to Thanksgiving.

Diwali, she said, is a celebration of the victory of good over evil, light over darkness, and also marks the new year.

"In modern terms, it's more of lighting the lamp within yourself, and thanking God for destroying the evil within us," Patel said.

Since coming to Baylor to study, Patel said she has celebrated Thanksgiving in different ways with friends, but mostly it is a time for her to rest and catch up with school work.

"The international students are getting together, and even though I don't celebrate it, it's nice to come together," she said.

Said said she thinks the cross-cultural appeal of Thanksgiving comes from the fact that America has so many different groups represented within the population.

"I feel like it's so easily adaptable in every culture," Said said.

Although now usually celebrated with people's family, originally Thanksgiving was a community celebration.

From the earliest examples, Thanksgiving was time when people came together from different backgrounds to celebrate and give thanks for one another and for God's blessings.

"It's a beautiful thing when you can forget about differences and come together as a community," Said said.

Columbus junior Erin Schneider said her family usually travels to Louisiana to visit family during the holiday, but this year they plan to stay home.

"(We're having) a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, just appreciating each other's sense of humor and growing and being healthy throughout the year," she said.

Schneider, a Christian, said Thanksgiving is also a reminder of the great things she has in her life.

"So many times I just get caught up in life and school, and I forget that I have these great things in my life," she said. "God plays such a huge role in the families that we are born into and the things we have to be thankful for."

And Schneider said she agreed Thanksgiving can be a time for people to find common ground.

"We should be thankful for the support we have in the community, and that we are able to have these celebrations so freely.