Research paper · RP08

Savouring Works — But for How Long?

Savouring is the practised skill of noticing a good moment and staying with it long enough for the feeling to register. Across twenty randomised trials and 4,805 adults, the pooled post-test effect of savouring programmes on emotional outcomes was a moderate Hedges g of 0.51 (95% CI 0.26 to 0.77). That number comes from Chen, Sie and colleagues (2026), the largest PRISMA-compliant synthesis in this lineage. Separate estimates in the same synthesis were g = 0.50 (0.24 to 0.75) for positive psychological states and g = 0.61 (0.31 to 0.91) for negative emotional symptoms. Heterogeneity was high (I² = 86.6%). Small-study tests did not show a clear publication-bias signal (Egger p = .108; trim-and-fill adjusted g = 0.48). The present review asked a narrower question than Chen et al.: what remains at one month and at three months in non-clinical adults, after gratitude-only trials are removed. Fewer than five eligible non-clinical controlled trials report extractable pairwise data at both of those windows. A durability meta-analysis is therefore not yet possible. The one non-clinical adult study that measured both one- and three-month follow-up is a single-arm pilot (Smith and Hanni, 2019). High-fidelity completers improved within person. That is not the same as an effect versus control. No CTRI-registered savouring trial was found. No trial in the pooled set was delivered in an Indian language to Indian working adults. For an Indian workplace programme the honest claim is this: a short daily savouring practice produces a moderate lift at the end of a two-week sprint. Whether that lift is still there at day 45 and day 90 has not been pooled. Measure it. Do not assume it.