A study on college students’ materialistic values in gratitude education at universities in Xinjiang, China

Universities serve as the bases for cultivating high-quality modern talents. College students play an important role in promoting sustainable education development. Their prosocial behaviors are not only related to personal growth and social harmony but also from the foundation of civilization progress. The purpose of this study is to explore the impact of college students’ materialistic values on their prosocial behavior, as well as the moderating effects of perceived social support and gratitude. The theoretical basis of this study is the value conflict theory, and the research subjects are college students from undergraduate institutions in Xinjiang. Through convenience sampling, this study surveyed students from eight undergraduate institutions, with four each from the northern and southern parts of Xinjiang, distributing 720 formal questionnaires and collecting 687 valid ones. The results show that materialistic values have a significant negative prediction on college students’ prosocial behavior; that is, the higher the level of materialistic values among college students, the lower their tendency to engage in prosocial behavior. Both perceived social support and gratitude have significant moderating effects on the relationship between materialistic values and prosocial behavior.