Essays on CityStep’s Values: Social Emotional Wellbeing of Young People
Wellbeing as Shared Practice in CityStep: A Bioethical Reflection
by Miles Meline, M.B.E., Bioethicist. CityStep Penn Co-Executive Director, 2018-2022
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As a bioethicist, I have come to see wellbeing not merely as an outcome to be achieved, but as a capacity for flourishing that people develop and cultivate together. As a former CityStep teacher, I have experienced how a classroom can either constrict or expand that capacity: the right kind of shared space can give children and undergraduate teaching teams room to express themselves, belong, and reach out to others, thereby cultivating empathy. This framing reflection brings those two perspectives together to make a simple claim: CityStep promotes social and emotional wellbeing not merely by teaching dance or providing an extracurricular activity, but by creating relationships and shared spaces in which young people can express themselves, experience belonging, exercise agency, and learn to respond to others with care.
Bioethics is often imagined as the ethics of hospitals, medicine, and clinical decisions. Yet it has always been concerned with something broader: the social conditions that allow people to live and develop well. On this fuller understanding, health and wellbeing are not simply the absence of illness or distress. They also include the ability to express oneself, a sense of belonging, meaningful relationships, bodily and emotional awareness, a sense of agency, and the capacity to navigate difficulties with support. The capabilities required to realize a healthy and dignified life—including affiliation, play, and the cultivated use of the senses and imagination—are central to human flourishing (Nussbaum, 2002). Similarly, a capabilities approach asks us to assess wellbeing not only in terms of the resources people possess, but also in terms of what they are actually able to do and be (Sen, 1979). By this measure, CityStep can be understood as a wellbeing-promoting practice: it helps create the protective and supportive conditions within which children and undergraduate teachers alike may flourish.
The philosophical heart of this claim is that wellbeing is not wholly private, strictly individual, or self-produced. People develop their identities, emotional capacities, confidence, and sense of possibility through their relationships with others. For this reason, CityStep is best understood through the related lenses of relational ethics and care ethics. Ethical relationships of this kind require attentiveness to others, responsiveness to their needs, respect for their dignity, and responsibility for the quality of the shared environment.
This is no abstraction at CityStep; it is part of the daily architecture of the classroom. A familiar early practice is to form a circle: everyone is connected and of equal value. That simple formation embodies the practices that define CityStep’s pedagogy: shared imagination and movement-making, collaborative leadership among undergraduate teachers, meaningful creative choices for children, negotiation, constructive feedback, and the freedom to try, make mistakes, and respond with resilience rather than shame.
Dance is not merely the content CityStep teaches; it is the medium through which relationships form. This matters philosophically. We come to understand one another not only through words, but also through the body—through what Merleau-Ponty described as intercorporeality (Merleau-Ponty, 1945/2012). Scholars of embodied affectivity similarly describe bodily resonance, mirroring, and synchronized movement as processes that can support empathy and co-regulation (Fuchs & Koch, 2014). When students pass a pulse around a circle or mirror a partner’s movement, they are practicing empathy before it is explicitly named. The body becomes a site of meaning, and empathy becomes a practice rather than a lecture.
One reason CityStep’s pedagogy can be effective is that moral capacities are not isolated inner traits. They are holistic formations of perception, feeling, judgment, and action, shaped partly by the environments in which young people repeatedly practice relating to themselves and others (Kamtekar, 2004). CityStep does not simply tell children to be empathetic, collaborative, confident, or inclusive; it gives them repeated, embodied situations in which those capacities can be practiced until they become livable habits. This reframes our work more accurately: we are not merely transmitting values as abstract instructions. We are structuring conditions—rituals, spatial formations, feedback practices, and mentoring relationships—under which care and agency become easier to enact.
Understood in this way, CityStep’s pedagogy carries a set of ethical commitments worth naming plainly: respect for the dignity and equal moral worth of every participant; the cultivation of agency and voice; duties of care and nonmaleficence; trauma-informed awareness that some children carry significant burdens into the room; and a commitment to justice and inclusion. Undergraduate teachers play a role in sustaining these commitments that is easy to underestimate. By showing up consistently and responsibly, they offer one more dependable, supportive relationship within a broader community of care.
CityStep’s contribution to health and wellbeing is therefore simultaneously individual and relational. Through creative movement, participants may strengthen their capacities for expression, confidence, empathy, connection, cooperation, and resilience. These are not isolated outcomes lodged inside separate individuals. They arise from relationships and, in turn, strengthen the quality of the larger community. In strengthening individuals, CityStep also strengthens the social fabric. In this modest but meaningful sense, the program helps enact the social change it seeks.
References
Fuchs, T., & Koch, S. C. (2014). Embodied affectivity: On moving and being moved. Frontiers In Psychology, 5, Article 508. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00508
Kamtekar, R. (2004). Situationism and virtue ethics on the content of our character. Ethics, 114(3), 458–491. https://doi.org/10.1086/381696
Merleau-Ponty, M. (2012). Phenomenology of perception (D. A. Landes, Trans.). Routledge. (Original work published 1945)
Nussbaum, M. (2002). Capabilities and social justice. International Studies Review, 4(2), 123–135. https://doi.org/10.1111/1521-9488.00258
Sen, A. (1979). Equality of what? In The Tanner Lectures on Human Values (pp. 195–220). Stanford University.
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Miles Meline, MBE, is a bioethicist and philosophy PhD student at the University of Pennsylvania. His work focuses on the moral and political dimensions of science, medicine, health, and social justice. He earned his Master of Bioethics (MBE) from Harvard Medical School and his BA in philosophy and biology from the University of Pennsylvania. As an undergraduate, Miles served with CityStep Penn for four years as a teacher, head teacher, co-events coordinator, and co-executive director. Drawing on these experiences, his contribution to the Social and Emotional Wellbeing Committee examines CityStep’s pedagogy through the lenses of bioethics, relational wellbeing, empathy, and care.
Emotional and Academic Benefits of CityStep from a Developmental Perspective
by Debra Rosenblum, M.D., Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist at the Cambridge Health Alliance. Longtime CityStep Enthusiast
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CityStep specifically serves fourth through sixth graders from urban elementary schools. This cohort, ages 9-12, described as tweens” because they are between developmental stages- not quite little children, small enough to be lifted and cuddled and not quite adolescents, allowed increasing independence. As children grow older, their unconscious developmental task is separating from their family, which can leave them feeling lonely and vulnerable. When they were younger, they managed their internal conflicts and anxieties with imaginary play and toys or make-believe friends, displacements no longer available to them as they evolve from the Piagetian stage of concrete operations to formal operations.[1] CityStep provides a safe and secure holding environment during this period of heightened insecurity. The well-established structure of the CityStep Program encourages imagination and play in the form of narratives told through dance. During a time which can be scary for children as their bodies are changing, the freedom and release of dance re-establishes a sense of mastery and grounding in the body and enhances a sense of self-control.
CityStep differs from traditional dance programs or other afterschool sports with its unique focus on joy and imagination to help fill the developmental gaps experienced by tweens. The beloved exercises, “Family Portrait” and “Family Portrait Dance Battle.” intertwine the creativity of forgotten play elements with invigorating body movement. Peer mentors and mirroring facilitate social interaction and decrease isolation. Generating stories that become dance routines strengthen collaborative problem-solving and narrative skills.
Published research establishes the cognitive advantages of a weekly dance program to meet the classroom demands of fifth grade in preparation for the transition to middle school.
Measurable academic benefits include the following:
Improved focus (as dance requires concentration, planning, and timing)[2][3]
Improved working memory (memorization of routines and coordinating with rhythm), specifically by stimulating parts of the brain and increasing brain-derived neurotrophic factor, which enhances these cognitive functions[4]
Enhanced ability to sequence (also due to following choreography/steps) to follow stepwise procedures
Expanded cognitive flexibility and task switching
Structured movement improves inhibitory control (impulse control)
CityStep classes provide weekly opportunities to improve student-instructor communication and negotiation skills that can translate into wins in the classroom. Each session involves constructive dialogue, turn-taking, and active listening, which can lead to improved listening skills, greater verbalization of needs, and improved frustration tolerance.
The World Health Organization recommends that children and adolescents engage in at least 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity each day. It also advises aerobic activity up to three times a week to strengthen the muscles and bones of growing bodies.[5] Many children and adolescents spend disproportionate amounts of after-school time in screen-related activities, which can predispose them to obesity and depression. CityStep uses movement and dance to improve coordination, stamina, and body awareness and control, which can be a crucial anchor at this time when students feel their bodies changing in unexpected ways. Additionally, the exercise itself leads to the release of endorphins, which can increase emotional well-being.[6]
One research study looked at 8-10-year-old African American girls, parents and guardians who were involved in a 2-year dance intervention program and found that-cholesterol and depressive symptoms decreased significantly compared to matched peers not in the dance group.[7] One RCT study has shown that a weekly dance program for teenagers led to increases in serotonin and decreased dopamine and thereby reduced depressive and anxious symptoms.[8]
Footnotes
1. Piaget, J. and Inhelder, B. The Psychology of the Child 1969 Basic Books
2. Diamond A, Lee K. Interventions shown to aid executive function development in children 4 to 12 years old. Science. 2011;333(6045): 959–964. doi:10.1126/science.1204529
3. Rudd, J., Buszard, T., Spittle, S., O’Callaghan, L., and Oppici, L. (2021). Comparing the Efficacy (RCT) of Learning a Dance Choreography and Practicing Creative Dance on Improving Executive Functions and Motor Competence in 6-7 Years Old Children. Psychol. Sport Exerc. 53, 101846. doi:10.1016/j.psychsport.2020.101846
4. Teixeira-Machado L, Arida RM, de Jesus Mari J. Dance for neuroplasticity: a descriptive systematic review. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2019;96:232–240. doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.12.010
5. WHO (2020). WHO | Physical activity - Fact sheet 2022-04-21, WHO, Fact sheet. Available at: https://www.who.int/en/news-room/fact-s. Accessed from 2022-4-22.
6. Yan A.F., Nicholson, L.L., Ward, R.E., Hiller, C.E., Dovey, K., Parker, H.M., Low, L-F., Moyle, G. and Chan, C. The Effectiveness of Dance Interventions on Psychological and Cognitive Health Outcomes Compared with Other Forms of Physical Activity: A Systematic Review with Meta‑analysis Sports Medicine (2024) 54:1179-1205
7. Robinson, T. N., Matheson, D. M., Kraemer, H. C., Wilson, D. M., Obarzanek, E., Thompson, N. S., et al. (2010). A Randomized Controlled Trial of Culturally Tailored Dance and Reducing Screen Time to Prevent Weight Gain in Low-Income African American Girls: Stanford GEMS. Arch. Pediatr. Adolesc. Med. 164 (11), 995–1004. doi:10.1001/archpediatrics.2010.197
8. Jeong Y.-J., Hong S.-C., Lee M. S., Park M.-C., Kim Y.-K., Suh C.-M. (2005). Dance Movement Therapy Improves Emotional Responses and Modulates Neurohormones in Adolescents with Mild Depression. Int. J. Neurosci. 115 (12), 1711–1720. 10.1080
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Debra Rosenblum, MD is a Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist at the Cambridge Health Alliance. She also established a clinic for adults with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, the DANAA, clinic, to address the behavioral health needs of this often overlooked population. One of her fondest memories is being in the audience of the original CityStep show in 1984 and she has been a fervent CityStep supporter in person and from afar ever since.
a path toward resiliency: CityStep as a balm for the trauma we carry
by Mireya Nadal-Vicens, M.D., Ph.D., Chief of Behavioral Health, Harvard University Health Services. 1989-1991 CityStep Co-Executive Producer
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Today’s youth often face childhoods more likely to result in trauma than resiliency. In a middle school environment of increasing isolation and challenges, CityStep helps children experience a variety of resiliency factors that have been studied and shown to offset the effects of trauma. CityStep focuses on bringing creative dance to inner-city public schools, where students often face higher levels of income inequality, financial uncertainty, unpredictability in the home and caregiver environments and immigration status than the average middle school population. These students may also experience overt trauma in the forms of emotional neglect or even physical or sexual abuse.
One common and well-studied response to trauma is dissociation [https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4439425/]. This is primarily seen in cases where there is no perceived escape from the traumatic situation and is much more common in young children. It is a protective response where the mind or consciousness leaves or dissociates from the body. This minimizes the awareness of the acute pain or stress and may result sometimes in apparent amnesia or haziness as to the traumatic events. It is protective in the short-term but comes ats a psychological cost long-term, as it interferes with the ability to be emotionally present and engaged, and results in emotional distancing from oneself and from others. The trauma remains unaddressed and often presents in the form of physical symptoms.
[https://www.besselvanderkolk.com/resources/the-body-keeps-the-score]. In connecting CitySteppers to their bodies and helping them express emotions through movements, the CityStep curriculum helps those that have survived traumas reconnect with their dissociated bodies and more fully integrate. Furthermore, by first eliciting individual movements (created by the students) and then weaving those individual contributions into a narrative whole (the final dance piece), CityStep provides scaffolding with which students learn to integrate their internal disparate and disconnected experiences into a narrative whole.
A supportive and nurturing relationship with an unrelated adult is a modifiable risk factor for trauma and resilience [https://www.cdc.gov/aces/risk-factors/index.html]. This kind of relationship is at the very core of CityStep’s structure, with the additional bonus that the relationship is not based in the academic arena (where those who perform academically get the positive reinforcement whereas those who struggle don’t). Furthermore, this relationship is experienced primarily through nonverbal communication – the language of dance. This provides a special and unique relationship to those who may not be able to communicate verbally effectively due to the toll of trauma.
In summary, CityStep provides a therapeutic-adjacent intervention, completely outside the mental health field, that addresses childhood challenges and fosters resilience in an accessible, joyful environment where CitySteppers connect with their bodies, express their emotions and build community narratives from individual contributions.
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Mireya Nadal-Vicens, M.D., Ph.D., Chief of Behavioral Health, Harvard University Health Services. 1989-1991 CityStep Co-Executive Producer
As We Move, So We Live: CityStep, an Embodied Experience
by Rebecca S. Houghton, M.S., M.A., Dance/Movement Therapist. CityStep Harvard Co-Executive Director, 1986-88
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Introduction
It is not a coincidence that we call emotionally powerful experiences “MOVING.” Body, mind, and emotion are profoundly interwoven, and when we shift one, we shift all three.
Essential elements of mental health and well-being are: expressing our emotions; building our sense of self and belonging in community. As humans, we access these foundations experiences through our bodies, movement, sound and rhythm – DANCE!
By its very nature, CityStep distills these foundational experiences, making them accessible and appealing to both elementary school children and college students.
Movement and Early Development
Before you were born, you heard the rhythm of your mother’s heartbeat, and you were rocked by the movement of her body (DeCasper & Fifer 1980).As an infant, you shared movement, exchanged sounds, and made eye contact with your caregivers(Trevarthen & Aitken, 2001). As a child, it was through movement that you lived in your body and connected with others (Malloch & Trevarthe, 2009). Moving with others was the blueprint for your development, and in CityStep, we revisit this blueprint.
The First Relationship (Stern, 1977) presents interactions between caregiver and child as a dance. Through natural movements, such as a caregiver raising her eyebrows in response to a baby's grin, both partners read and respond to one another in an ongoing flow of shared engagement. CityStep college students provide an important role as mentor to school children, recreating some of this caregiver relationship.
Affect Attunement (Stern, 1985) - Caregivers intuitively match the baby's movements and sounds (without mimicking them across three main dimensions
Intensity: Matching the loudness of a sound with the starkness of a gesture.
Timing: Sharing the exact rhythm, duration, or beat of the baby's behavior.
Shape: Mapping the physical space of a movement into a vocal rise or fall.
Object Relations (Mahler et al., 1975). – Moving together helps us internalize that we are separate from our caregiver and that “objects” – ie, other people – are also constants. I am always here, and you are always here. Dancing with another creates a sense of safety (Winnicott, 1971).
Creative movement is inherently and deeply healthy. Potent movement experiences deepen developmental growth, help fill in developmental gaps, and even establish new developmental pathways.
Movement and Communication
It can be extremely difficult, even impossible, for people to verbalize their emotions and needs. Creative movement is a language in itself, one that is accessible to everyone. In CityStep, we celebrate this language.
Creative movement allows you to express yourself non-verbally. A tight fist and a punch in the air communicate being angry; rocking slowly communicates calm. As you make these movements, you not only communicate these emotions but also experience them. It is a virtuous cycle – we feel emotions and express them physically, and then, when we express them physically, we experience these emotions (Shafir et al., 2016)
When you dance with somebody and mirror them, or exchange and build movements together, you are practicing reciprocity, the give and take that is critical in conversations and relationships. (Mirror neurons research) Reciprocity involves continual cycles of:
Initiating, responding, adapting, anticipating, repairing (Rizzolatti & Craighero, 2004).
Dancing together creates what psychologists call mutual prediction. Each dancer continually updates movement based upon:
visual cues, touch, rhythm, weight shifts, timing, emotional expression (Wilson & Knoblich, 2005).
When people move creatively together they become dynamically coupled. This coupling has been described as:
interpersonal coordination
behavioral synchrony
joint action
(Sebanz & Knoblich, 2006)
Dancing together is a physical experience of communication skills: brainstorming, collaborating, defining one’s ideas.
Movement and Sense of Self
As we gain confidence in our movement, become more comfortable in our bodies and find more joy in movement, our sense of who we are and our belief in our self-worth grow. CityStep approaches dance through a joyful, natural lens, such that learning dance steps isn’t a source of anxiety.
Proprioception – This is the kinesthetic sense of where our bodies are in space. Can you tell when your arms are straight out to the side without looking? Can you feel when you are hunched over? Can you tell when your feet are “hip-width apart” without checking? When you know where you are in space, you know more about who you are (Proske & Gandevia, 2012)
Choreography – By creating movement patterns, rhythms, shapes and symbols, we tell our stories. We use symbolic expression and make connections to archetypal narratives (Pallaro, 1999).
How we move is how we live. When you fully use your kinesphere (the bubble of space above, below and around you), you learn that you can “take up space” in your life. When you stand up straight, you experience “having a spine.” When you move in many directions (straight line, curvy line, up, down, right, left) and qualities (sharp, fast, heavy, light), you experience what it is like to be flexible in your life. (Laban, 1966).
A free, intentional and celebratory framing of the idea of moving one’s body and dancing with others provides both elementary school children and undergraduates to experience agency.
Movement and Belonging
Dancing together creates community. Dancing together provides a place everybody belongs. In CityStep, young people from 10 to 22 years old engage in a give and take with our “movement village.”
Moving together creates what psychologists call behavioral synchrony, which helps people experience themselves as part of a larger whole (Tarr et al., 2015).
One of the strongest findings is that moving together in time with others helps people feel connected. Researchers (names) have found that dancing together:
Increases feelings of trust
Makes people perceive one another as more likeable
Encourages cooperation
Strengthens group identity
(Tarr et al., 2015)
Conclusion
CityStep is an extraordinary model that enhances the critical factors that contribute to one’s mental health and well-being:
experiencing healthy development through strong relationships with adults;
learning communication and conversational skills;
building a strong sense of self-worth and
belonging to an inclusive community.
References
DeCasper, A. J., & Fifer, W. P. (1980). Of human bonding: Newborns prefer their mothers' voices. Science, 208(4448), 1174–1176. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.7375928
Laban, R. (1966). Choreutics (L. Ullmann, Ed.). Macdonald & Evans.
Launay, J., Tarr, B., & Dunbar, R. I. M. (2016). Synchrony as an adaptive mechanism for large-scale human social bonding. Ethology, 122(10), 779–789. https://doi.org/10.1111/eth.12528
Mahler, M. S., Pine, F., & Bergman, A. (1975). The psychological birth of the human infant: Symbiosis and individuation. Basic Books.
Malloch, S., & Trevarthen, C. (Eds.). (2009). Communicative musicality: Exploring the basis of human companionship. Oxford University Press.
Pallaro, P. (Ed.). (1999). Authentic movement: Essays by Mary Starks Whitehouse, Janet Adler and Joan Chodorow. Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
Proske, U., & Gandevia, S. C. (2012). The proprioceptive senses: Their roles in signaling body shape, body position and movement, and muscle force. Physiological Reviews, 92(4), 1651–1697.
Rizzolatti, G., & Craighero, L. (2004). The mirror-neuron system. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 27, 169–192. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.neuro.27.070203.144230
Sebanz, N., Bekkering, H., & Knoblich, G. (2006). Joint action: Bodies and minds moving together. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 10(2), 70–76. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2005.12.009
Shafir, T., Tsachor, R. P., & Welch, K. B. (2016). Emotion regulation through movement: Unique sets of movement characteristics are associated with and enhance basic emotions. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 2030. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.02030
Stern, D. N. (1977). The first relationship: Infant and mother. Harvard University Press.
Stern, D. N. (1985). The interpersonal world of the infant: A view from psychoanalysis and developmental psychology. Basic Books.
Tarr, B., Launay, J., Cohen, E., & Dunbar, R. (2015). Synchrony and exertion during dance independently raise pain threshold and encourage social bonding. Biology Letters, 11(10), 20150767. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0767
Trevarthen, C., & Aitken, K. J. (2001). Infant intersubjectivity: Research, theory, and clinical applications. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 42(1), 3–48.
Wilson, M., & Knoblich, G. (2005). The case for motor involvement in perceiving conspecifics. Psychological Bulletin, 131(3), 460–473.
Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and reality. Tavistock.
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Rebecca S. Houghton, M.S., M.A., Dance/Movement Therapist. CityStep Harvard Co-Executive Director, 1986-88