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Awe fosters positive attitudes toward solitude

Nature Mental Health (2024)Cite this article

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Abstract

Research in psychological science has predominantly focused on the importance of social interaction to health and well-being, neglecting how solitude relates to optimal functioning. Although solitude is sometimes perceived as an aversive state associated with loneliness and ostracism, solitude can also serve as a time for self-reflection and spiritual awakening. The aim of the current set of studies was to examine if the experience of awe might serve as an important state influencing people’s attitudes toward solitude. We propose that experiencing awe makes people feel alone but not lonely—dispelling the myth that solitude incurs loneliness—and, importantly, that awe leads to positive attitudes toward solitude. Here eight studies, using complementary designs (big data analytics, experiments, experience sampling and intervention), tested and supported these hypotheses. We found that these effects of awe were mediated by self-transcendence. Furthermore, we probed the downstream consequences of these effects, showing that a brief awe intervention enhanced spiritual well-being and peace of mind by augmenting positive attitudes toward solitude.

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Fig. 1: Pictorial measure used in study 3.
Fig. 2: Spiritual well-being and peace of mind scores for each group at each time point.

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Data availability

Data, stimulus materials and preregistrations of studies 3, 4, 5 and 7 are available in Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/VU7QF/ (ref. 70). The databases (PsycArticles and PsycInfo) mentioned in the introduction of this article can be accessed via https://www.ebsco.com/.

Code availability

All statistical code files are available in OSF at https://osf.io/VU7QF/ (ref. 70).

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by a Major Project Grant awarded to T.J. by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 32271127).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences and Beijing Key Laboratory of Behavior and Mental Health, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Yige Yin, Wenying Yuan, Chenxiao Hao, Yuhui Du & Tonglin Jiang

  2. School of Electronics Engineering and Computer Science, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Zhengbo Xu

  3. Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA

    Joshua A. Hicks

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Contributions

Y.Y., Y.D. and T.J designed research and collected data; W.Y., C.H. and Z.X. contributed new analytic tools; Y.Y. wrote the paper; W.Y., C.H., Y.D., J.A.H. and T.J. provided critical revisions; and T.J. supervised research.

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Correspondence to Tonglin Jiang.

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Nature Mental Health thanks Thuy-Vy Nguyen and the other, anonymous, reviewers for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Yin, Y., Yuan, W., Hao, C. et al. Awe fosters positive attitudes toward solitude. Nat. Mental Health (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44220-024-00244-y

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