The final episode in our Virtues for Well-being series features Dr. Demond Hill, Assistant Professor of Health Equity at Tufts University in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human Development. Dr. Hill explores the power of awe—a transcendent emotion that can foster connection, healing, and flourishing, even in communities and spaces too often overlooked or marginalized.
In the final episode of our Virtues for Well-being series, host Ayla Fudala speaks with Dr. Demond Hill, Assistant Professor of Health Equity at Tufts University, about the science of awe—and why we may be able to find it in places we least expect.
Awe is often associated with mountaintops, breathtaking landscapes, or extraordinary experiences. But Dr. Hill’s research asks us to look closer. Drawing on his work with Black and Brown high school students in Boston, he explores how awe can emerge in everyday neighborhoods, relationships, art, play, and even spaces that might initially seem overlooked or “awful.”
The conversation also examines how awe may support mental health, social connection, belonging, and human flourishing, while challenging us to think about what these ideas mean in communities facing structural inequality. Dr. Hill shares lessons from his youth participatory action research and explains why listening to young people may be essential to creating healthier, more equitable communities.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
Learn more about Dr. Demond Hill and his research at Tufts University:
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Frontiers in Health & Happiness is the official podcast of the Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, exploring the science of health, happiness, and well-being.
Ayla Fudala: Hello and welcome to Frontiers in Health & Happiness, the official podcast of the Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. My name is Ayla Fudala, Senior Communications Coordinator, and I'll be asking experts how to live a healthy, happy life.
You're listening to the final episode of our six-part Virtues for Well-being series, where we're exploring how core human virtues like purpose, empathy, generosity, and joy shape our physical, mental and social health.
Today's guest is Dr. Demond Hill, assistant professor of health equity and Tufts University's Elliot Pierson Department of Child Study and Human Development. His research focuses on the mental health and well-being of marginalized children, youth, and their families, with a particular emphasis on Black populations. Dr. Hill collaborates with communities to promote and protect opportunities for all belonging and human flourishing. In this conversation, we'll explore Dr. Hill's research on awe, drawn from a three-year youth participatory action project with Black and Brown high school students in Boston.
Thank you so much for joining me today, Dr. Hill. I wanted to begin by asking what inspired you to focus on awe in particular?
Dr. Demond Hill: Awe creeped up on me. I had an opportunity to do my PhD at UC Berkeley, and while I was there, I was originally focused on education as a whole. While I was at Berkeley, I seen this man walking on campus. It was Dacher Keltner and Dr. Dacher Keltner is, in a lot of ways considered the awe guy. He studies it. He's been doing incredible work in the area through relationships. He ended up being a primary mentor of mine while I was thinking broadly about a number of emotions, number of feelings as it relates to our children. My work is primarily a little bit more on the side of joy and shame and guilt and embarrassment and other emotions that are part of that.
However, the work in just rubbing shoulders with Dr. Keltner made me start to consider and think deeply about awe itself. One of the things I wanted to play with is, I had an opportunity to go to a particular part of San Francisco that has an incredibly beautiful view. Every day I drove there, I was in awe. Didn't have the language for it. Anytime I would have small one-off conversations with the children as they are jumping off of the trees, swinging from the swings as the water is behind them. Joyous. I didn't have a word to capture that. Awe consistently came up for me.
The unique thing though, that I thought about was, does awe really live here? Or am I making it live here? And in that, that is where my work has gravitated towards. What does awe look like in the spaces and places that could be considered, with all of the research out there, spaces that awe does not exist, that awe cannot flourish in? And I want it, on one hand to prove that it does, and to show where and how it looks. And on the other hand, I wanted to highlight what structurally is occurring, in particular at the micro and macro levels, that are in ways tarnishing, damaging, stripping the experiences of awe in communities.
Ayla Fudala: How do you define awe, and how do you distinguish it from joy or gratitude?
Dr. Demond Hill: Dr. Keltner would say awe has a vastness. It's an experience that opens you, that pops, in a way, the bubble. I mean, that bubble could be in a lot of ways for folks, the capitalistic, patriarchal, white supremacist bubble. It bursts that.
Joy, in my opinion, although closely related; joy has to me a different type of feel and texture to it. So while awe in my mind can come with a stuckness-- your mouth drops on the floor, your eyes get big. Your breath slows down. You are one with. As we always talked about, you kind of get lost in the beauty around you, or you get lost in a lot of ways. In a lot of my stories, potentially life and death, those experiences that kind of stick with you and move through you everywhere you go. Joy, in my opinion, in the ways that I have studied joy, are the ways that the youth have taught me how to look at joy. As joy has a complexity in and of itself, where it is laughter, where it is a degree of freedom and flow.
Ayla Fudala: Awe, at least in my head, is very linked to dramatic natural vistas like mountaintops, cliff sides. Is there a way to experience awe without being a part of nature or being in dramatic natural scenery?
Dr. Demond Hill: So there's a lot of scholars that have been playing with this concept, and I think the cool thing that I have kind of gravitated towards is what a lot of my peers, and this is stemming from a larger discipline, affect theory, that has thought about the minor and messiness of life and how oftentimes, as we're achieving or chasing happiness, the goal of it, chasing joy, chasing the virtues, that oftentimes we're missing out on the messy road along the way. And in that, I have found myself going to cities like New York and being caught, in my opinion, in between what my youth have brought to the table, which is awful environments and spaces, and awe inspiring, and how in various places they do clash.
And so when we are seeing, in my opinion, these humongous buildings with beautiful architecture and trees hanging off the side of it, you are inspired. You do get lost. You do look up in the sky and feel the wonder and feel the bliss. However, that can be quickly stopped by the loud sirens, can be quickly stopped with the screaming and the yelling, but also can be confronted with the real material realities of many of our folks, such as looking down and seeing numbers of unhoused folks being walked over, stepped over, forgotten. And so, in many ways, I think we oftentimes are looking up in getting lost in the big rivers and the cliffs and you name it and the buildings.
And there's a number of good work that is saying awe also is coming from what could be considered awful or the ugliness of our society and world. And when you're noticing and seeing someone unhoused that we are stepping over, stepping aside from, forgetting-- for a lot of folks, those are their source of inspiration and wonder and bliss that motivates them to want to create change and move into the careers where they actually can be able to support.
Ayla Fudala: Wow. So you're saying awful sights can actually be inspiring because they motivate you to make a change?
Dr. Demond Hill: Absolutely, absolutely. And in addition to that, I think when you go into cities like New York, or Oakland, California, or LA, there is awe in watching the lowriders drive through the neighborhood with the beautiful colors and the big wheels. There is awe in watching a crowd celebrate their heritage and playing the music. There is awe in watching the graffiti of Malcolm X or Martin Luther King or Audre Lorde or Toni Morrison riddled throughout your community to remind you of who you are and what you are a part of. There is awe in the loud music that is being played that touches your heart and brings you together with others and allows for that connection and belonging.
So while it could be existing in this container of structural violence or structural inequality, awe is still there. And my vision and my hope is as simple as what I think I got. Let's shift our gaze. If I shifted and I see awe right here and I believe it can exist here, then I'm willing to make it happen. And I'm going to find the people who are also willing to make it happen with me.
Ayla Fudala: Turning to the impacts of awe, are there any effects on your mental, physical, or social health that come from experiencing awe?
Dr. Demond Hill: There has been such incredible work on this area. Dr. Keltner, many who are a part of this, I would say community of scholars, have found that it does reduce stress. It does increase your desire to connect with others. It does allow for, again, that slowness that I think oftentimes we don't get and we seek and we yearn for. So the benefits have been incredible.
However, I want to find ways to bring those benefits to the communities that are struggling in various different ways, that it might be a little harder to shift their focus to because it's in this world. And this is, I think, the truth, and it's something that I've been told often is, why would I worry about awe when I don't have enough money to pay my rent? I think those are real, complex questions to sit with. They're not things we can set aside. So I've been challenging myself to hold that and remind folks that awe has an ability to allow for clarity for you, and that clarity can push you, encourage you (I hope, fingers crossed) to navigate your stressors in your life with a little bit more foundation, groundedness.
And so in various ways, I think health-wise, mental, physical and emotional, incredible work. And I think I'm holding the reality that for some folks, they don't see the reality, the material reality, or the impact of awe because they're dealing with so much other things that are distracting them from it. However, I've been trying to bring our beautiful community of folks I'm in to see that awe can help them navigate those situations better.
Ayla Fudala: How can awe contribute to human flourishing?
Dr. Demond Hill: Awe on its own cannot. It may, at an individual level, get you closer to what you desire and yearn for when it comes to human flourishing. However, I believe that when it's contained to just an individual that is selfishly, you know, for me or to me is as much as awe about you. It is about the community in the world around you. It's about allowing for you to take your shoes off and socks off, and let your feet sink into the grass that you're in, onto the ground that you're in, holding hands with others, linking arms with others. And so, as much as awe itself is powerful, incredibly beautiful, awe by itself is not enough. Awe requires us to actually connect, and it requires honesty.
Ayla Fudala: How can awe challenge structural inequality?
Dr. Demond Hill: I would give two potential ways. At the individual level, I think it has the opportunity, the possibility to shift our gaze and attention. So while there may be many things in our communities that will allow for us to walk away, move away and hide, or when we look at it in the minor and messy forms, can actually bring us in and requires us, in a way, and sparks that wonder and yearning to bring others in with us, to be able to provide the support necessary and need it.
And then structurally, which is what I'm trying to do, or at a macro level, what I'm trying to do is work with our young folks. Center them in the discussion. I think one of the biggest forms, and I been encouraged to think about this a lot, one of the first forms of oppression is around age, ageism. And we often don't listen to our youth who have the answers. And in that, I believe when we bring our youth to the center, we ask them the questions that they have been yearning, that they want to answer. We bring in the eight wonders of awe. We center them, and we challenge them to turn this into actionable awe. How can we create the communities that we want, that we want to see? Share with them these beautiful opportunities. Take them on these excursions around the world and around Boston, and hope in various ways, and know actually, that they will bring their beautiful creativeness and create the very things that they believe are necessary for their communities to thrive and to flourish.
Ayla Fudala: You're currently on the first year of a three-year youth participatory action research project with Black and Brown High School students in Boston. How is this project structured and what makes it different from a traditional research study?
Dr. Demond Hill: Yeah. So while it's still in various ways a traditional research study, it moves and breaks those boundaries in three simple forms. One end is, youth participatory action research centers me as their scholar and researcher, which I think is an important part of the process as much as, and this is where I'm holding two things as once, as much as it's de-centering me, it brings me to let go of the control that I have been taught to have over the work I do, and by letting go of that control and putting the power in the hands of the youth, it breaks these normal, traditional, conventional ways of doing research.
So again, moving into the messiness of the work, youth are going to tell you they like something one day and they'll tell you they don't like it the next day. Trust them. They'll tell you that they believe this is true. Trust them. It allows for me, in a way, not to worry so much about outcomes. Not to worry so much about definitions, but to actually allow for storytelling, to allow for freedom, and to create a space where our youth are allowed to just be. I think when you bring in community-based participatory action research, you're now opening the walls and doors for our youth to then contribute to their actual larger community.
So another form of it is adding the I to ICBPAR, with I standing for intergenerational. The work should be, as much as it's about our young babies, our young babies should be able to interact with our elders. Our elders have so much to offer our world as well. So my work, our work, the community’s work is in various ways that and so it slows me down. Publications may take 2 to 3 years to come out. Outcomes may be small. Outcomes may be large. I am in this way, as a scholar, experiencing the awe by just being in community with them and longing for them as a larger community across generations, across race, ethnicity. To just create.
Ayla Fudala: You've used an awe and flourishing literacy after school program with awe excursions. What did those excursions look like?
Dr. Demond Hill: So the first phase that we're currently in is, we have taken the youth who are in a particular neighborhood, we've taken them throughout their neighborhood. So what you'll hear a lot about with the work is that the cool thing that they have been able to do is, before we took them on these excursions, these walkthroughs, their community, we wanted them to just tell us what they already know about their community. They didn't have so many nice things to say. But while they did these awe sessions where it was guided, it was encouraged to look at the messiness as sites of inspiration and wonder and curiosity. They were pushed even in times where they were like, I cannot see how this could be awe-inspiring, Dr. Hill.
Eventually they saw it as a challenge to make it awe-inspiring. So great opportunities have been taking them to a park that they have described as an area where they cannot be because of violence, because of police presence. However, while we walked through that park, they seen nuggets and corners and trees as opportunities for awe, so it was just as beautiful of an experience. They've walked through their communities, they're looking at their murals, they're taking pictures of the buildings. They're looking at how they want to redesign and recreate a playground or park.
And then there's going to be more opportunities, which is taking them to a Boston Celtics game and letting them get caught in the awe of sports, taking them to the Boston Museum and allowing for them to get lost in the science, get lost in seeing huge dinosaurs and beautiful paintings and pictures, also taking them to the edge of the water and seeing what that brings in, sparks, for them. So just as much as it is about navigating and seeing what is in your community, it’s also taking you to other communities where awe is also existing, and finding ways to actually connect to that.
Ayla Fudala: Your work centers, youth and community voices and uses participatory methods. How have students shaped your research questions or methods?
Dr. Demond Hill: They have shaped a lot of it. And this makes me think of a quote from Toni Morrison when she was writing The Site of Memory, which is, you know, “They straightened out the Mississippi River in places to make room for houses and livable acreage. Occasionally the river floods these places. Flood is the word they use, but in fact it is not flooding. It is remembering. Remembering where it used to be.”
And in a lot of ways, that is what the youth, I call them my babies, what my community is doing for me, is what I've done as a researcher. I have to own my privilege. I have to own the power I have, and I have to own the history of research, which has been straightening out the Mississippi River and to make it generalizable, easier to understand, easier to manage. And when things flood over in my world, that means something went wrong. The research was inconsistent. You didn't use the right method. You didn't use the right argument. You didn't say the right word. You didn't study the right population.
But actually that's wrong. As I am navigating and moving through my career, being in community, being human, I have to own and think about the various ways I have straightened the Mississippi River for others around me and for myself. I am just allowing, as a scholar, for others to tell me what they need. There's no need to straighten the Mississippi River. Actually, we're doing the work of remembering. We're doing the work of recovery. We're doing the work of replenishing and repair. And I wouldn't have gotten that if it if I was not in the community spending days, hours, building and connecting.
Ayla Fudala: What have you learned from the first year of this project about how youth make sense of and experience awe in their everyday life?
Dr. Demond Hill: I had a vision that I would provide them with this curriculum, share with them the findings from all this beautiful work, put headphones on and play incredible music, and within months they would be ready to go. But they weren't. They actually need an opportunity to just be, to slow down. So what I've learned on one end is that awe, as much as I want to provide and give it to them and share it with them and show them, it takes time to build that trust for them to be willing for me to be the one that hands it to them, for me to be the one that shows them.
And I think in another way, as much as they have been resistant to it in various ways because of their circumstances, because of the weight and pressures of the world around them, there have been many, many moments where they want it and they want it bad. So holding the two is a big thing that I've learned, that it's going to come with ups and downs. Awe, just as much as it is about wonder in losing yourself in the vastness and being connected, it brings up a lot of hurt and pain as well. And I have to own and honor that.
Another thing that it has allowed for me to learn is that they are the visionaries. They are creative. All we have to do is provide them with the tools, give them the money and watch what they do. And it has been such a blessing being a part of that experience.
And I think the last thing I will say, which is just again, to hold the complexities, is that at the end of the day and our little safe haven or awe haven, if you want to call it, they still have to go into communities that deal with police violence. Deal with poverty. Deal with horrible air quality, environmental racism. Deal with trash. Deal with a community that is not taken care of and supported by others at the state level. They have to go back into those communities and navigate. And so a big thing has been when our youth come back, we still have to do work. So it feels like while we're taking three steps forward on a Monday, Tuesday we may take two steps back, but that's okay. We're still moving forward in the long run. So in the beauty, it's messy, and in the mess it's beauty.
Ayla Fudala: Were there any surprising or unconventional places where students discovered awe, spaces that many people might overlook or even label as awful?
Dr. Demond Hill: Yeah. I think one which, you know, might not click for a lot of people, but it definitely did for our team, is that they like to joke a lot. They like to make fun of each other a lot. And that was a big place where awe was bubbling, was through comedy, rough-housing, rough play. And while there were many moments where I was like, we have to stop, they were like, no, we're having fun. And that checking in reminded me that awe is right there, and them naming it allowed for me to honor it and hold it as well.
And so just as much as we love to go to comedy shows and listen to and laugh our tails off, I think our youth are yearning for a place where they can just be. And so while an adult may come in there and say, you all need to stop, this is not good behavior, yada yada, I actually think in that small little bubble of awe, they are enjoying every single second of it. So it's not my job as an adult to come in and pop it. I can, as an adult, ask questions to ensure that everyone here is having the same experience.
So that's one area, and I think another area that many may say could be considered awful is these alleyways, these nooks and crannies, these open fields where the grass might be a little longer. A lot of the youth described those places as the space where they play. They play flag football. They have little trampolines that they jump off of. These are the alleyways that they may race each other down, that they may eat snacks on the corner. Those are also these environments that could be transformed into awe that they're transforming into awe-inspiring.
The last I'll say, which has been really unique and really amazing in my opinion, is how bus stops have become potential sites of awe inspiring. The youth spend so much time on the bus, they spend so much time at bus stops, they spend so much time at the corner store. Those environments also could be learning environments. So how can we alter and switch and change the bus stop and buses to be awe inspiring, to be sites of learning? I think that is a huge area that our youth have been bringing to us.
Ayla Fudala: How could you make bus stops inspiring?
Dr. Demond Hill: There's an incredible scholar at Temple University who has been thinking about playful learning environments, and one of the ways that they have been doing the work is allowing for the side of a bus stop to be monkey bars, or actually using the concrete as an artistic display. Why don't we, like, actually paint a hopscotch board on the concrete. So they have been thinking of these smaller ways to inspire, and our youth have also been bringing that to the table as well. And one of the ways our youth was talking about was it would be really nice, hey said, you spend so much time at the bus stop, it would be nice if it had a little TV. So these are things that are wonderful and I think we have to honor them just as much as we honor going to the middle of the woods and getting lost in the vastness of nature.
Ayla Fudala: In what ways, if any, did participating in this project seemed to affect students’ mental health, sense of belonging, or visions for their communities?
Dr. Demond Hill: The mental health aspect is one that we want to track over a longer course of time. And so in this exploratory phase, the nuggets of gold that we have found have been related to their sense of belonging, and have been related to their visions for their community. When we first asked, we said, has anyone ever experienced awe before? Does anyone know what awe is? One out of the students said they did and gave a fairly great response. Many of the students were kind of wondering what it could be. But over a few weeks one student actually went to New Hampshire, and had their own personal experience, and uttered the words, “I sat there and thought that this is what God wanted me to have”. And that, I think was so powerful.
Again, a part of that quote around Toni Morrison is the remembering. Remembering the awe that you have experienced over the course of your life is just as important as the awe that you experience going ahead. And in that remembering process, this student yearned to bring that back. So that's one way that we're noticing is in the process of remembering. A lot of the youth are like, I want others to also experience this too.
And in another way that we have seen it in the sense of belonging or connection, has literally been where many would think is an awful experience, where kids are joking with each other and picking on each other and playing with each other rough. Those have been the sites where they actually felt closer than ever. A lot of these discussions and just bare bones tell me stories have been real serious sites for them, where “For the first time, I got to hear and see the beauty in my peer.” So moral beauty has been a humongous part of the process since the belonging has been at the core of, “When I see beauty in you and I hear your story and I get to be with you, I in myself am experiencing awe, and I yearn to take the little nuggets of beauty that you have and innocence and insert them into my everyday life.”
Ayla Fudala: For practitioners, educators, or community leaders listening, what are a few practical ways they might begin to cultivate awe and flourishing in their own settings, especially in under-resourced urban environments?
Dr. Demond Hill: I think this brings me back again to the quote from Toni Morrison, which is, you know, “They straightened out the Mississippi River in places to make room for houses and livable acreage. Occasionally the river floods these places. Floods is the word they use, but in fact it is not flooding, it is remembering. Remembering where it used to be.” Youth are going through their own process of remembering, finding ways to think about what they want to do for their community, what they want to do for themselves, what they yearn for, for the world.
I also think adults who are educators, practitioners need to tap back into our memory bank and remind ourselves of our younger self. What did our younger self need? And have that real, honest conversation, which is required of awe, a critical love practice, which is you're being honest, that you're not honoring your younger self and you're not honoring the younger selves of others, and you're going to commit yourself to doing so in very simple ways: asking youth what they need and trusting that they have the answer, and providing the resources, space, opportunities for them to flourish.
And then the last I will say, which is my biggest thing and things that I love, is I know the world is a hot mess, to say the least. But there is so much around us. We have to start to shift our focus, shift our gaze to thinking about the minor and messy ways awe can show up. And while we may want to focus on the trash and how gross this street is, and how no one takes care of this street, having an awe focus, being awe-inspired is saying, wow, there's so much we can do here. That little shift I believe is so powerful, and more than anything, is really powerful in a school setting. We can think about things, we can shift our foundation, and I believe we can get closer to human flourishing.
Ayla Fudala: Are there any final words you'd like to leave our audience with?
Dr. Demond Hill: Go experience the everyday-ness of awe. Find it in the people that you love. Go sit on your corner. Go sit on your stoop and get lost in the essence and flow of your community. Actually catch the flow of your community. Do you know the pace of your community? Go see a neighbor and hug them. Slow down. There are so many opportunities here in this beautiful place to experience awe at the big level and at the small level.
Ayla Fudala: Thank you so much to Dr. Demond Hill for joining us to discuss the importance of awe and the powerful role it can play in promoting human flourishing and health equity. His work reminds us that awe is not reserved for mountaintops and museums-- it can emerge and overlooked even “awful” spaces. And when mobilized intentionally, it can be a transformative force for healing, resilience, and communal well-being.
As our Virtues for Well-being series draws to a close, a clear throughline has emerged. Virtues are not optional extras. They are powerful, evidence-based pathways to resilience, health, and thriving communities. From Dr. Victor Strecher, we learned that having a sense of purpose can buffer us against adversity and serve as a protective factor for mental health. Dr. Sara Conrath showed us that generosity and empathy are not only good for others, but also profoundly good for us. Dr. Richard Weissbourd underscored that raising caring, ethical children requires that we prioritize their moral development at least as much as their happiness and achievements.
We also explored how these virtues can be cultivated in daily life and across the lifespan. Dr. Richard Davidson's neuroscience research proved that training our minds, especially through mindfulness practices, can literally rewire our brains and increase our capacity for flourishing. Dr. Emiliana Simon-Thomas's Big Joy Project showed that even one small, intentional act each day can spark joy and contribute to our well-being. And today, Dr. Hill helped us see that awe can be cultivated in marginalized communities as a source of healing, equity, and collective thriving.
Across this series, the message has been consistent virtues and emotional states like purpose, empathy, generosity, caring, mindfulness, joy, and awe are not abstract ideals: they can be cultivated, and are essential for our mental, physical, and social health. And when we nurture them not just in individuals, but in families, neighborhoods, and policies, they become catalysts for happier, healthier and more just communities.
This has been another episode of Frontiers in Health & Happiness, the official podcast of the Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. To learn about upcoming events, visit our website, sign up for our mailing list, and follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, BlueSky, Facebook, and YouTube. Thank you for listening.