Table 6.

Independent t tests of linguistic differences in gratitude letters by baseline emotional exhaustion (concerning or not) and emotional exhaustion improved (or declined) at the 1-week follow-up.

Hypothesized categories	Baseline EEa				EE improvement 1 week later
	EE concerning, mean (SD)	EE not concerning, mean (SD)	t (df)	P value	EE decliners (n=63), mean (SD)	EE improvers (n=175), mean (SD)	t (df)	P value
First person (eg, I, I’ve, and my)	10.96 (4.52)	10.91 (5.10)	0.17 (1070)	.87	11.88 (4.59)	10.65 (4.24)	−1.93 (236)	.06
First-person plural (eg, we, let’s, and us)	0.74 (1.48)	0.84 (1.69)	−1.01 (981.69)	.31	0.82 (1.46)	0.81 (1.65)	−0.03 (236)	.98
Negative emotion (eg, annoy, angry, and scream)	1.16 (1.54)	0.92 (1.36)	2.76 (1066.53)	.005	1.04 (1.56)	1.02 (1.42)	−0.10 (236)	.92
Positive emotion (eg, appreciate, funny, and thank)	8.61 (4.71)	8.61 (5.20)	−0.032 (1070)	.98	9.88 (7.27)	8.51 (4.56)	−1.73 (236)	.09
Cognitive processing (eg, accept, because, and realization)	12.13 (5.28)	11.89 (5.42)	0.73 (1070)	.47	11.52 (5.28)	12.06 (5.27)	0.70 (236)	.48

^aEE: emotional exhaustion.