ArticleFrontiers in psychology2026
Moral elevation and prosocial behavior in college students: the mediating role of gratitude and the moderating role of empathy.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Introduction: With growing attention to moral development in society, the moral cognition and behavior of college students have become important topics of interest. Moral elevation may influence individuals' sense of obligation toward others and is thought to relate to prosocial conduct through affective pathways, including but not limited to gratitude. Grounded in the Social Intuitionist Model and the Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis, this study proposes a moderated mediation model to explore the relationship between moral elevation and prosocial behavior, with gratitude as a mediator and empathy as a moderator. Methods: Using standardized questionnaires, data were collected from 1,261 college students on moral elevation, gratitude, empathy, and prosocial behavior. Among the participants, 54.08% were male ( Results: The results suggest that moral elevation is positively associated with prosocial behavior, and that gratitude may play a mediating role in this association. Furthermore, empathy appears to moderate the relationship between moral elevation and prosocial behavior, with the effect being more pronounced among individuals with lower levels of empathy. Discussion: This study explores the role of gratitude and empathy in connecting moral elevation with prosocial behavior in college students. These findings yield important implications for theory development and practical applications within educational and psychological domains, particularly in promoting gratitude, enhancing empathy, and fostering prosocial behavior.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.