Tracking Health and Wellness Applications of Brain Science

awe

How feeling awe in nature can spur mental well-being and personal growth

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You might enjoy ski­ing or hik­ing. But do you feel at home in the moun­tains? Do you feel con­nect­ed to the wilder­ness? Accord­ing to a new study, that sense of being “home” in nature could be linked to your life sat­is­fac­tion and per­son­al growth, at least for young peo­ple. Anoth­er new study of old­er peo­ple finds that a con­nec­tion to nature seems to make them hap­pi­er and more will­ing to help oth­ers.

In the first study [Read more…] about How feel­ing awe in nature can spur men­tal well-being and per­son­al growth

Awesome: Brain scans shed light on the brain networks supporting Awe

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When was the last time you expe­ri­enced awe?

Per­haps you were stopped in your tracks by a beau­ti­ful vista on a recent hike, or cap­ti­vat­ed by a paint­ing at your local art muse­um, or moved to tears at a con­cert or church. Or maybe you were just sit­ting on your couch breath­less­ly watch­ing an episode of Plan­et Earth. What­ev­er it was, you prob­a­bly weren’t think­ing much about your­self or your to-do list.

What makes awe so trans­port­ing, over­whelm­ing, even mys­ti­cal at times? Researchers explored this ques­tion in a recent study pub­lished in the jour­nal Human Brain Map­ping (details below) by exam­in­ing what the brain is doing when peo­ple have an awe expe­ri­ence. [Read more…] about Awe­some: Brain scans shed light on the brain net­works sup­port­ing Awe