In the article “Elevation: A review of scholarship on a moral and other-praising emotion”, the term elevation is defined as a positive moral feeling that is in response to seeing the good deeds or actions of others and as a result motivates us to do the same (Thompson & Siegel, 2017). Stories of humans doing good deeds that make me feel elevated and want to do good deeds myself usually involve humans helping animals in need because I like animals and they can not speak for themselves and ask for help and thus when humans help animals in need, they are truly helping from the goodness of their heart. One particular news story that makes me feel elevated even though it is also very sad is volunteers and rescuers helping to try and save the animals in Australia from the wildfires that have been burning and brought Koalas to the classification of being endangered [ https://youtu.be/N9saImePOZw ]. In Australia fires have been burning that have destroyed much of the forest and environment and is so large that the fires can be seen from space. These fires are still mostly uncontrolled and have killed millions of animals and some people. People are donating their time and putting their lives in danger to try and help rescue the remaining animals trapped and wounded in the fires. The people are doing this good deed purely to try and help suffering animals who have been burnt. These volunteers are doing something very kind and for many their only compensation is the unspoken gratitude from the animals.
Though the story is sad because of the devastation and destruction from the fires; seeing these good deeds in the story makes me feel more hopeful about humanity and it shows there is still goodness in people. Individuals are so disconnected but in a time of need can still come together to try and help each other and animals. That is a nice thing to know and brings about positive feelings. Thompson and Seigel stated that from seeing someone do good deeds; positive outcomes someone may experience include feelings of upliftment and feelings of inspiration, positive views of humanity, and a desire to behave in a positive social manner and be around others (Thompson & Siegel, 2017). For me personally, from watching the video and reading about what people are doing in Australia I did feel a more positive view of humanity and it made me have feelings related to pro-social behavior because it makes you want to donate or try to help yourself in anyway you can. I wouldn’t say that I felt anything not mentioned in the article by Thompson and Siegel other then the sadness about the situation, however this is not due to the good deed which led to the elevation but rather due to the actual situation that the volunteers are trying to help with.
References
Andrew L. Thomson & Jason T. Siegel (2017) Elevation: A review of scholarship on a moral and other-praising emotion, The Journal of Positive Psychology, 12:6, 628-638
andrews Christpherson's Happiness Blog 