The case could be made that the holiday season is the season of awe. City Christmas trees decorated with millions of lights, a holiday gift that truly seems inspired, the brunch at a friend’s house where the food is sublime – all can inspire awe.
But who says we can’t have that feeling year round?
Feeling awed can be good for us, mentally and physically – and there are a number of ways to inspire awe. Making something large can make us feel awed, but so can using rare substances or executing a project with exceptional craftsmanship or cleverness. Technical brilliance can have the same effect. Awe is relatively easy with big budgets, but smaller sums shrewdly used can also inspire awe.
And why is it good for us to be awed?
Science has shown that when we feel awed, we’re more likely to do things that benefit others, and helping can take a variety of forms, some more individualized to a single beneficiary and others grander in scale. Needless to say, awe can also inspire bonding between people who experience it together. Researchers have also found that when people are experiencing awe, they feel less impatient and that there is more time available for whatever is planned. The awed among us are more satisfied with their lives.
We also, scientists have learned, process cognitive information more effectively and efficiently when we are awed. Feeling awed has been linked to lower inflammation levels throughout our bodies – so visits to many pilgrimage sites do indeed make people feel better.
As long as a place or thing inspires awe, awe-related benefits radiate from it. Based on what cognitive and physical scientists have learned about awe, it doesn’t seem to fade over time. With continued exposure to whatever is awesome, people will keep feeling, and being, better, mentally and physically.
The holiday season is over, but it can serve as a foundation of inspiration in building awe into our lives all year long. Making time to consider how we might create awe in our projects this spring is time well spent.
Sally Augustin, PhD, a cognitive scientist, is the editor of Research Design Connections (www.researchdesignconnections.com), a monthly subscription newsletter and free daily blog, where recent and classic research in the social, design, and physical sciences that can inform designers’ work are presented in straightforward language. Readers learn about the latest research findings immediately, before they’re available elsewhere. Sally, who is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, is also the author of Place Advantage: Applied Psychology for Interior Architecture (Wiley, 2009) and, with Cindy Coleman, The Designer’s Guide to Doing Research: Applying Knowledge to Inform Design (Wiley, 2012). She is a principal at Design With Science (www.designwithscience.com) and can be reached at sallyaugustin@designwithscience.com.