According to Carr (2013), the positive psychology approach majorly deals with the issues like wellbeing, happiness, and activities that enhance an individual's growth and develop meaningful relationships. In this context, wellbeing is studied regarding the positive side of an individual's life. Wellbeing, as defined by APA, is “a state of happiness and contentment, with low levels of distress, overall good physical and mental health and outlook, or good quality of life.”

It is widely credited that wellbeing is a multifaceted concept that includes multiple domains of human functioning. Wellbeing has been subdivided into subjective, objective, social, psychological, physical, and community wellbeing (Wilkinson, 1979; Kashdan et al., 2008; Burke et al., 2010; Pontin et al., 2013). In this study, they are being used as subjective wellbeing as a subjective experience. This study has taken physical, psychological, and relational wellbeing into account and used it as overall wellbeing. According to Pontin et al. (2013), wellbeing is divided into objective and subjective experiences of an individual. They have incorporated constructs of both eudemonic and hedonic theories into one theoretical framework and established the BBC subjective wellbeing scale. We have also constructed a present study's framework on this recent study and took psychological, physical, and relational wellbeing into account of subjective experience of wellbeing.

Mindfulness is explained as one's mental ability to keep self-attentive by paying attention intentionally (Park et al., 2013). In addition, mindfulness is the attention and awareness that is a universal ability inherent in human beings, and it is to pay attention in a special way, intentionally, at the present moment, thereby being aware of circumstances around the person in a non-judgmental way (Kabat-Zinn et al., 2011). Multiple factors are related to wellbeing. One of them is mindfulness. Researchers have studied mindfulness as a psychological construct and an emotional regulator in the previous few decades in the field of clinical psychology (Brown et al., 2007). In particular, mindfulness is studied as a predictor of better mental health. It has been used to treat mental health disorders such as anxiety, eating disorder, depression, sexual disorders, attention deficit hyperactivity, stress management, and substance abuse (Grossman et al., 2004; Chambers et al., 2009).

Recent studies have identified the connection of the above-mentioned features of mindfulness with self-determination (autonomy), personal growth, understanding others (positive relation with others), purpose in life, acceptance of self, and balance between inner and outer self (environmental mastery) (Wallace and Shapiro, 2006). Schutte and Malouff (2011) also suggested that higher life satisfaction, emotional intelligence, and positive effect and lower negative effect are the influencers of wellbeing. Hence, it can be said that mindfulness plays a vital role in one's positive mental health.

Gratitude is another characteristic which influences an individual's wellbeing. It has been conceptualized as an emotion, attitude, coping strategy, and trait or disposition (Emmons and Shelton, 2002; Emmons et al., 2003; David, 2019). According to the emotion paradigm, it has been explained as an emotion directly related to receiving support from others (McCullough et al., 2001). Thus, it is a positive feeling relating to the point of view of taking benefit from the actions of another individual (Emmons and Shelton, 2002; Emmons et al., 2003). In this perspective, gratitude serves as a motivator of helping and altruistic acts which result from receiving support from others. On the contrary, Abramson et al. (1978) explained gratitude in a more generalized sense of gratefulness for various characteristics of life, rather than taking it as social emotion. The tendency to be appreciative and grateful for the positive characteristics of life is called dispositional or trait gratitude. Moreover, Wood and Tarrier (2010) reported that gratitude is different from other positive emotions such as optimism and hope, and these positive emotions are explained by productive future expectations and the ability to identify the creative ways through which it can be achieved (Tong et al., 2010). In contrast, gratitude does not include expectations or other future-based thoughts. Instead, gratitude is primarily a definition of appreciating the positive facets of life in the present.

Looking from these different perspectives, it can be understood that gratitude is simply appreciation of the positive facets of the present life which may or may not need support from others. On the basis of this, this study operationalized gratitude as “the appreciation of what is valuable and meaningful to oneself and represents a general state of thankfulness and/or appreciation” (Sansone and Sansone, 2010). Gratitude is also correlated with depression. Wood et al. (2008) reported that having the feelings of thankfulness will make one's depressive phase more tolerable and shorter. Another study suggested that gratitude is negatively associated with depression (Seligman et al., 2005). According to the literature, individuals suffering from depression tend to have low levels of psychological wellbeing (e.g., Liu et al., 2009). Thus, on the basis of previous studies, it can be concluded that by increasing gratitude, psychological wellbeing can be enhanced.

Hope is defined by Snyder (2002) as basic cognitive, aim-oriented ways of thinking in which an individual comes up with alternatives to attain their objectives and remains motivated to follow and amend these alternatives if needed. According to him, individuals having hope will be active and consistent in attaining their goals. The most comprehensive theory for hope is given by Snyder, proposing hope as a cognitive set having components: agency and pathway thinking (Snyder et al., 1991). Positive emotions and thinking, as explained in a theoretical framework, will enhance an individual's ability to broaden their expectancies for the future, increasing hopefulness and psychological adjustment in the environment (i.e., life satisfaction and positive affectivity; Watson and Naragon, 2009; Datu and King, 2016). Hope makes an individual feel happy and well, which ultimately increases the hopefulness for the future. It is directly associated with subjective wellbeing (Bailey and Snyder, 2007).

The construct of hopefulness and happiness is multidimensional and is explained differently by different disciplines and used in distinct modes in daily functioning (Webb, 2007). Generally, hopefulness is taken as a positive construct that helps an individual to have a favorable view of the future. Many psychologists take it more as a positive emotion that helps to cope with stressful life situations (Fredrickson et al., 2003). Hopefulness is positively correlated with good mental health and better daily life functioning. It has been seen that gratitude helps manage depressed feelings by enhancing psychological resources, that is, hope (Fredrickson, 2001). Hopefulness promotes positive expectation in future of the expected results (Scioli et al., 2011). Existing literature supports the positive link between hopefulness and better psychological health (e.g., Bailey and Snyder, 2007; Muyan-Yilik and Demir, 2020). Hopefulness significantly impacts life satisfaction, and negative and positive effects (Muyan-Yilik and Demir, 2020). Furthermore, mindful individuals tend to respond to the stressful situations more proactively, which means having hopefulness, optimism, self-efficacy, and resiliency, increasing the positive outlook toward the future (Malinowski and Lim, 2015). From the above literature, it can be suggested that hopefulness plays an important role in having the positive personal coping reservoir that directly relates to an individual's wellbeing.

Literature provides us evidence that gratitude and mindfulness have a unique effect on wellbeing (e.g., psychological and subjective; Fredrickson, 2001; Wood and Tarrier, 2010) but provides little about the process between these variables. This study aimed to expand the existing literature and narrow the gap of mediating effect of hopefulness in explaining the relationship between mindfulness and gratitude with wellbeing. To our knowledge, no prior research has explored the process through which these variables work. Thus, this study is the first in identifying hopefulness as a mediating factor of gratitude and mindfulness in explaining positive wellbeing. Moreover, this study also explores the relationship between mindfulness and gratitude. It has been reported by the previous studies that a strong association exists between gratitude and mindfulness (Swickert et al., 2019). This type of research will help mental health professionals to make strategies and interventions for enhancing the mental health of the Pakistani population specifically.

The cross-sectional quantitative method was used in this study. Adults ranging from 18 to 40 years of age were contacted as participants for this study. Self-administered questionnaires were used to obtain data from respondents. The respondents came from various socioeconomic backgrounds in terms of gender, marital status, education, family structure, and monthly income. The survey was entirely optional, and participants were informed that their information would be kept private and anonymous. A convenience sampling strategy was used based on previous research (Etikan et al., 2016). A total of 500 people were contacted and invited to participate in the survey. With a significance level of 5%, the statistical power of 80%, the Four constructs employed in this investigation, 47 items, and an effect size of 0.15, the research model required just 119 sample observations to discover R² values of at least 0.25 (Hair et al., 2017). There were 374 valid responses in total. According to the results of the retrospective test (Cohen, 1992), recommended by statistical power analysis (Brysbaert, 2019), this number was sufficient. The sample has a statistical power of 0.95, which is higher than the suggested minimum of 0.80, according to G^* 3.1.9.2 software (Cohen, 1992).

A structural equation model (SEM) investigated the relationship between constructs. Because of the complexity of the developed model, the least square-based method (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze the data rather than other structural equation modeling procedures such as covariance-based structural equation modeling (CB-SEM). PLS-SEM is mainly composed of two parts. The measurement model, also known as the outer model, is the first part. The outer model calculates each indicator's contribution to represent its associated latent variable and evaluates how well the combined indicators represent a construct. The inner model assesses the latent variables' direct and indirect relationships (Hair et al., 2016). Despite its popularity in social and behavioral sciences for multivariate data analysis, the SEM's application in academic learning has recently increased. SEM combines various data analysis methods to simultaneously examine the relationship between latent and observed variables. SEM is beneficial in understanding phenomena that cannot be observed directly, such as abilities, characteristics, intentions, attitudes, and perceptions in education research. SEM is a combination of factor and regression analysis.

This section will look at the descriptive statistic for the latent variable in this study: means and standard deviations of the latent constructs in the study. Means and standard deviations for the latent variables in the study were computed as a numerical summary of the data set. These variables were assessed using a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 “strongly disagree” to 5 “strongly agree.” Table 2 shows the overall outcomes of latent constructs in terms of mean and standard deviation. The latent variable subjective wellbeing (SWB) has the highest mean of 3.32 and standard deviation of 0.98, indicating that most respondents rate SWB highly. Mindfulness (MIN) has the lowest mean of 2.54 and standard deviation of 0.86, indicating that MIN is rated highly by a small number of respondents. As a result, hopefulness (HOPE) and gratitude (GRA) have mean values of 2.84 and 2.83, respectively, with standard deviations of 0.97 and 0.99, demonstrating the respondents' given ratings, as shown in Table 2.

Before accessing the study's measurement (inner) model, a preliminary analysis was performed to ensure the accuracy of the data. This preliminary analysis includes the system's normality checks, missing value evaluations, outliers check, and standard method variance tests. However, some missing values were discovered and resolved using the most recommended mean replacement method. Researchers have widely anticipated this mean replacement method as the most effective tool for social science studies (Hair et al., 2017). This method is also unlikely to be affected by removing or changing other sample entries, such as lists of elimination and pairwise deletion, or by adjusting the mean values of the other variables (Hair et al., 2014).

To evaluate the measurement model in the SEM, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to confirm and refine the items (components) and constructs (latent variables). First, we evaluated the measurement model for analyzing the relevance of indicator loadings of a construct in PLS-SEM analysis (Figure 2). The reliability test confirms a measurement instrument's consistency in measuring a specific construct, whereas the validity test demonstrates a respective instrument's ability to measure the construct that it claims to measure (Sekaran and Bougie, 2010). Second, the relationship between latent and observable constructs was established in the outer model. This step required examining three criteria: internal consistency reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity (Hair et al., 2016).

An essential component of evaluating a SEM is testing the model's prediction accuracy (PA) and predictive relevance (PR). Because it shows the amount of variance explained by each endogenous variable, the coefficient of determination (R2 value) has been used to assess PA (Hair et al., 2019). According to Hair et al. (2019), a value of R2 ranging between 0 and 1 indicated a higher level of PA, with a significant value of R2 indicating a greater level of PA. As shown in Table 8, the R2 values of the latent constructs hopefulness were 0.417, demonstrating a significant level of PA, while the R2 value of the other latent variable, subjective wellbeing, was 0.150, indicating a sufficient level of predictive accuracy (Henseler et al., 2015). The evaluation of predictive relevance (PR), on the other hand, was assessed by running the blindfolding procedure to compute the Q2 value. According to Hair et al. (2014), a >0 Q2 value shows that the PR of the latent constructs is achieved. This study result revealed that the Q2 values generated for each construct are significant, implying that the proposed model in this study has good PR. Table 8 shows that R-square and Q2 values were found to be sufficient by the defined criteria.

This study has contributed to both theoretical and social implications. According to existing literature, mindfulness has a direct impact on wellbeing; however, in this research, it was found that hopefulness plays a mediating role between mindfulness and wellbeing, which is the new contribution to present literature specifically in the Pakistani context. Therefore, this study is an essential contribution to validating the broaden-and-build theory's (Fredrickson, 2001) applicability on diversified cultures. This study also highlights that youth suffering from depression or other psychological issues can benefit from positive psychological interventions. As hopelessness is a significant factor of a depressive state, it can be indicated that inducing hopefulness could be a significant element of the treatment plan of professional clinical psychologists. However, we recommend further research to investigate clinical samples and examine the duration of the effects.

The significant social implication of this study in introducing hopefulness is one way of improving the social wellbeing of Pakistani youth. Even the present government is highly involved in motivating youth to participate in nation building, this study can be used as a guideline for the government to continue designing youth empowerment programs at local, regional, national, or even collaboration with international agencies. It may escalate hopefulness in youth for a better future.

There are a few limitations of this study. This study used the cross-sectional method, so the generalizability of findings can be questioned. Furthermore, the theory used in the study focuses on youth only; similar studies with other age groups can highlight the importance of cultivating positive emotions. Therefore, there are some crucial recommendations for future research on this topic. First, as the broaden-and-build theory postulates that peoples' experiences of constructive emotions broaden their momentary thought–action repertoires, which results in the accumulation of physical, intellectual, psychological, and social resources, this study only studied and found evidence of increment of psychological resources named as increased life satisfaction, positive emotions and decreased negative emotions, etc. There is room for more research to see the impact of positive emotions on physical, intellectual, and social resources. Second, research studies exploring behavior modifications through positive emotions can also add to the literature on practical implications of broaden-and-build theory. Third, the trait of hopefulness needs to be explored more about other positive emotions such as happiness and grit. Fourth, it is essential to note that we explored wellbeing using the BBC subjective wellbeing scale (BBC-SWB), which measured many psychological variables such as autonomy, life satisfaction, and positive relationships with others named as few cumulatively calling it subjective wellbeing. Studying the impact of positive emotions on these variables separately will enhance the understanding of subjective wellbeing in a more specific way. Fifth, different sets of samples such as comparing working and non-working women or studying the effect of positive emotions at the workplace on the wellbeing of employees can help to prepare specific human resource policies for different industries. Sixth, there is a high need to design experimental studies to show the real effects of positive emotions in this study: gratitude and mindfulness on subjective wellbeing. Such studies using experimental methods can also promote experiential learning of the general population to understand the influential role of positive emotions in leading a happy and meaningful life. Seventh, to understand hopefulness as a mechanism of the relationship between mindfulness and subjective wellbeing in developing nations, it is essential to replicate this study on diverse populations of other developing nations. Lastly, in this study, we have used PLS_SEM for the analysis, which has some limitations. For instance, it does not provide a global fit statistic for models. This is a particular limitation and becomes difficult when an overall fit statistic is not available. For the future research, researchers may use other statistical approaches to gain more insight about the topic.

In conclusion, it can be said that the advantages of nurturing positive emotions on subjective wellbeing are the main highlights of this study. This study also signifies the importance of studying the emotion of hopefulness in the Pakistani context in more depth. It is proved to be an essential mechanism of strengthening the relationship between other positive emotions and the subjective wellbeing of youth.