Unlocking flourishing: Life awe fosters positive youth development during and after the COVID ‐19 pandemic

Abstract In the context of various risk factors that threaten adolescents' prosociality and well‐being, life awe, which provides a broader perspective on life, may help to foster positive youth development. The current study aims to examine whether life awe is positively associated with adolescents' prosocial behavior and subjective well‐being during and after the COVID‐19 pandemic. We conducted two complementary studies to test our hypotheses using a mixed‐methods approach. Study 1 analyzed 16,591 valid Weibo blogs from 12,498 Chinese adolescents ( M age = 20.69, SD age = 2.76; 74.08% female) posted in the COVID‐19 pandemic (January 1, 2020–December 31, 2020). This study explored semantic associations among life awe, prosocial behavior, and subjective well‐being in a real‐world context. Study 2 involved two waves of longitudinal data from 2299 Chinese adolescents ( M age = 14.63, SD age = 1.62; 38.32% female) collected during the postpandemic period (October 2023–April 2024), providing longitudinal insights into these relationships. The results of two studies indicated that life awe was significantly and positively associated with adolescents' prosocial behavior and subjective well‐being during and after the COVID‐19 pandemic. By advancing empirical understanding of life awe, these findings suggest that life awe could serve as a novel target for interventions aimed at promoting positive youth development both during public crises such as pandemics and in everyday life.