Center Seminar Series

The Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness invites both Harvard and non-Harvard faculty and researchers to discuss topics related to the mission of the Center.

2021–2022

The theme of the 2021–2022 seminar series is recovery and resilience. For upcoming seminars, visit our Upcoming Events page.

• September 21, 2021 – Dr. Lisa Berkman, Thomas D. Cabot Professor of Public Policy, Epidemiology, and Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health 
  • “The Workplace and Worker Well-Being: Work as a Social Determinant of Health”
• October 27, 2021 – Dr. Arthur C. Brooks, Professor of the Practice of Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and Arthur C. Patterson Faculty Fellow at the Harvard Business School 
  • “Three Life Lessons from COVID-19: We Can Come Out Happier than We Went In”
• November 17, 2021 – Dr. Andrew Steptoe, Head of the Department of Behavioural Science and Health at University College London 
  • “Loneliness, Well-Being, and Resilience During and After the COVID-19 Pandemic”
• December 15, 2021 – Dr. Cindy H. Liu, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School
  • “Developmental and Generational Perspectives to Understanding COVID-19 Young Adult Mental Health”
• January 26, 2022 – Dr. Vish Viswanath, Lee Kum Kee Professor of Health Communication and Co-Director of the Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “Class, Communication, and Well-Being: Analyses from a Cross-Sectional Study of Youth from Lower Socioeconomic Groups in India”
• February 23, 2022 – Dr. Kristen Nishimi, Data Science Postdoctoral Fellow in Psychology at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco
  • “Psychological Resilience: Potential Implications for Physical Health”
• March 22, 2022 – Dr. Shekhar Saxena, Professor of the Practice of Global Mental Health at the Department of Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “Social Resilience, Hope, and Recognition in the New Gilded Age”

Past Seminars

The 2020–2021 seminar series focused on health equity & positive well-being.

• September 23, 2020 – Dr. Mika Kivimäki, Professor of Epidemiology & Public Health, University College London 
  • “Social Inequalities in Physical and Psychological Health: An Update on Current Knowledge”
• October 28, 2020 – Dr. Vikram Patel, Pershing Square Professor of Global Health, Department of Global Health & Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Adjunct professor & Joint Director, Centre for Chronic Conditions & Injuries, Public Health Foundation of India 
  • “Transforming Mental Health in the Covid Era”
• December 2, 2020 – Dr. Cheryl Giscombé, LeVine Family Distinguished Associate Professor of Quality of Life, Health Promotion and Wellness, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing
  • “HARMONY: The Development of a Culturally-Relevant, Randomized Controlled Mindfulness-Based Stress Management Intervention to Reduce Cardiometabolic Risk in African American Women” No recording available
• January 27, 2021 – Dr. Ashley Whillans, Assistant Professor in the Negotiation, Organizations & Markets Unit at Harvard Business School
  • “Alleviating Time Poverty: Evidence from a Pre-Registered Longitudinal Experiment”
• February 24, 2021 – George Ward, M.Sc., Behavioral Scientist, MIT Sloan School of Management
  • “Happiness at Work”
• March 24, 2021 – Dr. Michèle Lamont, Professor of Sociology and of African and African American Studies and the Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies at Harvard University 
  • “Social Resilience, Hope, and Recognition in the New Gilded Age”
• April 28, 2021 – Dr. Jennifer Prah Ruger, Amartya Sen Professor of Health Equity, Economics, and Policy at the University of Pennsylvania
  • “Applying the Health Capability Profile”
• May 19, 2021 – Dr. Carol Graham, Leo Pasvolsky Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution
  • “When Twin Public Health Crises Meet: Trends in Ill-Being and Deaths of Despair during the COVID Pandemic”

The 2019–2020 seminar series focused on resilience at the individual, city, and policy level.

• September 25, 2019 – Anita Chandra, DrPH, Vice President and Director of RAND Social and Economic Well-Being 
  • “Building Community Resilience: Grassroots and Grasstops”
• October 23, 2019 – Willem Kuyken, PhD, Ritblat Professor of Mindfulness and Psychological Science, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford

  

  • “Preventing Depression Across the Lifespan with Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy”
• November 20, 2019 – George Bonanno, PhD, Professor of Clinical Psychology, Columbia University Teachers College
  • “Resilience to Loss and Trauma: What is it and why are we (usually, but not always) good at it?”
• January 22, 2020 – Karmel Choi, PhD, Clinical and Research Fellow, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Massachusetts General Hospital
  • “Psychological Resilience: What Can Genomic Approaches Teach Us?”
• February 26, 2020 – Alonzo Plough, PhD, Clinical Professor of Health Services, University of Washington School of Public Health, Vice President for Research and Evaluation and Chief Science Officer, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
  • “Moving from Disparities to Equity to Thriving: Operationalizing a Culture of Health”

The 2018–2019 seminar series focused on two themes: (1) translation and communication and (2) biology and well-being.

• September 26, 2018 – Steve Gortmaker, PhD, Professor of the Practice of Health Sociology, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “Translating Research for Policy and Practice: the CHOICES Project and Implications for Happiness”
• October 17, 2018 – Gina McCarthy, MSc, Professor of the Practice of Public Health, Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “Translating Science to Policy: Lessons from Climate Change”
• October 25, 2018 – Richard J. Davidson, PhD, William James and Vilas Research Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry, Founder and Director of the Center for Healthy Minds, University of Wisconsin-Madison

  

  • “Well-being Is a Skill”
• November 28, 2018 – David Silbersweig, MD, Chairman, Department of Psychiatry and Co-Director for Institute for the Neurosciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School Dean for Academic Programs at Partners HealthCare, Stanley Cobb Professor of Psychiatry, HMS
  • “Brain Systems for Resilience”
• January 23, 2019 – Eric Loucks, PhD, Associate Professor of Epidemiology, Associate Professor of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Associate Professor of Medicine, Brown University
  • “Population Health Impacts of Mindfulness: Opportunities, Evidence, and Pitfalls”
• February 27, 2019 – Winnie Yip, PhD, Professor of the Practice of International Health Policy and Economics, Department of Global Health and Population, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “From Social Experiments to Policy Decisions: China’s Health Care Reform”
• March 27, 2019 – Karen Emmons, PhD, Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
  • “Building an Evidence Base that is Useful for Population Health”
• April 24, 2019 – Suzanne Segerstrom, PhD, Professor of Psychology, University of Kentucky
  • “Well-being, Immunosenescence, and the Brain”