Developing the STARR framework of gratitude among South Korean adolescents

Korean students achieve high academic performance within a high-stakes education system, while concerns about student well-being remain. Although gratitude has been proposed as a potential psychological resource, applying etic frameworks to this population may overlook culturally situated meanings. To address this limitation, the present study adopted an emic perspective to examine how Korean adolescents experience gratitude. Using interpretative phenomenological analysis, the authors analysed five weeks of diary entries from 21 middle school students aged 13 to 15 years. The analysis yielded the STARR framework, which comprises five interrelated dimensions: Sense (noticing received benefits); Transition (reframing routine care as gift-like); Affect (experiencing gratitude alongside other emotions); Recognise (inferring benefactors’ intentions and burdens); and Respond (expressing thanks, reciprocating, or adjusting behaviour). This culturally grounded framework provides considerations for culturally sensitive gratitude education.