GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Moved by this idea: One of my favorite books on wild awe is this one rich with personal narrative, cultural history, naturalistic description, and the science of mountaineering: Macfarlane, Robert. Mountains of the Mind: Adventures in Reaching the Summit. New York: Vintage Books, 2004.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
a study of wild awe: Anderson, Craig L., Maria Monroy, and Dacher Keltner. “Emotion in the Wilds of Nature: The Coherence and Contagion of Fear during Threatening Group-Based Outdoors Experiences.” Emotion 18, no. 3 (2017): 355–68. Anderson, Craig L., Maria Monroy, and Dacher Keltner. “Awe in Nature Heals: Evidence from Military Veterans, At-Risk Youth, and College Students.” Emotion 18, no. 8 (2018): 1195–202.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Growing up in poverty: I review this science in chapter 5 of The Power Paradox: How We Gain and Lose Influence. New York: Penguin Press, 2017.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
“In the woods, we return”: Emerson, Ralph W. “Nature.” In Ralph Waldo Emerson, Selected Essays. New York: Penguin, 1982, 39.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
In many ways, “mean egotism”: Twenge, Jean M. Generation Me: Why Today’s Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, and Entitled—and More Miserable Than Ever Before. New York: Atria, 2006. Sansone, Randy A., and Lori A. Sansone. “Rumination: Relationships with Physical Health.” Innovations in Clinical Neuroscience 9, no. 2 (2012): 29–34.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
world has become more narcissistic: Twenge, Jean M., and W. Keith Campbell. The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement. New York: Atria, 2010.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Emerson’s mean egotism hypothesis: Piff, Paul K., Pia Dietze, Matthew Feinberg, Daniel M. Stancato, and Dacher Keltner. “Awe, the Small Self, and Prosocial Behavior.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 108, no. 6 (2015): 883–99. I cannot help but report a telling limitation of this study: eucalyptus trees, as awe-inspiring as they are, are an invasive species in Northern California and cause many problems due to their oily leaves and seeds. We can feel awe, and often do, for wonders—invasive species, authoritarian leaders, false prophets, and disseminators of false information—that lead us astray.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Out in the trees: Wohlleben, Peter. The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate—Discoveries from a Hidden World. Vancouver; Berkeley: Greystone Books, 2016. Haskell, David G. The Songs of Trees: Stories from Nature’s Great Connectors. New York: Viking, 2017. Sheldrake, Merlin. Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures. New York: Random House, 2020.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Our participants feeling wild awe: In another relevant study, simply viewing ten awe-inspiring images of nature led participants to share more of a resource with a stranger in a trust game. Zhang, Jia W., Paul K. Piff, Ravi Iyer, Spassena Koleva, and Dacher Keltner. “An Occasion for Unselfing: Beautiful Nature Leads to Prosociality.” Journal of Environmental Psychology 37 (2014): 61–72.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
experiences of awe lead us: Stellar, Jennifer E., Amie M. Gordon, Craig L. Anderson, Paul K. Piff, Galen D. McNeil, and Dacher Keltner. “Awe and Humility.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 114, no. 2 (2018): 258–69.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Some backpackers completed: Atchley, Ruth A., David L. Strayer, and Paul Atchley. “Creativity in the Wild: Improving Creative Reasoning through Immersion in Natural Settings.” PLoS ONE 7, no. 12 (2012): e51474. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0051474.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Polarization: Jesse Shapiro has documented the rise of political polarization in the United States and its sources (internet use is not one!). Here’s a recent piece of his: Boxell, Levi, Matthew Gentzkow, and Jesse Shapiro. “Cross-Country Trends in Affective Polarization.” NBER Working Paper No. 26669, June 2020, revised November 2021. https://doi.org/10.3386/w26669.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
We assume that we are reasonable: Robinson, Robert, Dacher Keltner, Andrew Ward, and Lee Ross. “Actual versus Assumed Differences in Construaclass="underline" ‘Naive Realism’ in Intergroup Perception and Conflict.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 68 (1995): 404–17.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
wild awe might defuse: Stancato, Daniel, and Dacher Keltner. “Awe, Ideological Conviction, and Perceptions of Ideological Opponents.” Emotion 21, no. 1 (2021): 61–72. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0000665.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
Americans often sense the Divine: Froese, Paul, and Christopher D. Bader. America’s Four Gods: What We Say about God—and What That Says about Us. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
people reported spiritual experiences: Marsh, Paul, and Andrew Bobilya. “Examining Backcountry Adventure as a Spiritual Experience.” Journal of Outdoor Recreation, Education, and Leadership 5 (2013): 74–95. https://doi.org/10.7768/1948-5123.1188.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
sociologists assessed the natural beauty: Ferguson, Todd W., and Jeffrey A. Tamburello. “The Natural Environment as a Spiritual Resource: A Theory of Regional Variation in Religious Adherence.” Sociology of Religion 76, no. 3 (Autumn 2015): 295–314. https://doi.org/10.1093/socrel/srv029.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
traditional ecological knowledge, or TEK: Pierotti, Raymond. Indigenous Knowledge, Ecology, and Evolutionary Biology. New York: Routledge, 2011.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
During experiences of wild awe: Today, plant biologists are documenting how plants show evidence of communication, adaptation, and even intention in how they communicate with other plants through root systems or in the chemicals they release when preyed upon by insects. For a skeptical view of plant consciousness, see: Taiz, Lincoln, Daniel Alkon, Andreas Draguhn, Angus Murphy, Michael Blatt, Chris Hawes, Gerhard Thiel, and David Robinson. “Plants Neither Possess nor Require Consciousness.” Trends in Plant Science 24, no. 8 (2019): 677–87. For another perspective, see: Simard, Suzanne. Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest. New York: Alfred Knopf, 2020.
GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT
experiences of awe: Zhao, Huanhuan, Heyun Zhang, Yan Xu, Jiamei Lu, and Wen He. “Relation between Awe and Environmentalism: The Role of Social Dominance Orientation.” Frontiers in Psychology 9 (2018): 2367. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02367.