Lenwood Hayman: Improving the lives of underprivileged populations

Lenwood Hayman is an assistant professor of health education and health behavior in the Department of Public Health and Health Sciences at the University of Michigan Flint. Trained as a social-health psychologist, Lenwood’s research focuses on the social, psychological, structural, and environmental influences of emotional arousal in underprivileged populations.

Specifically, Lenwood’s studies have focused on the influence of stress on the disparate rates of obesity in African American women and low-income families, the various negative consequences that result from poor mental health in African American men (i.e., mass incarceration, interpersonal violence, unprotected sexual promiscuity, alcohol/drug abuse, etc.), and academic achievement in first-generation and non-traditional students.

In efforts to develop a concerted effort to combat these issues, Lenwood established the Mindful Promotion of Healthy Emotions & Learning (Mind-PHEL) research team in which he and his colleagues study how mindfulness-based activities can inspire and maintain healthy eating behaviors, black male mental health, and positive student learning outcomes.

Lenwood earned his Ph.D. from Wayne State University as a graduate research fellow of the National Institutes of Health. Lenwood extended his expertise via postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health, and later as a fellow of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Development at the Center for Human Growth and Development, also at the University of Michigan.

Overall, as a recovering perfectionist and functioning practitioner, Lenwood is committed to maintaining the contemplative pursuit of a just society via his scholarship, teaching, and constantly evolving practice of lovingkindness.