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Health Effects of Viewing Landscapes – Landscape Types in Environmental Psychology
Abstract
The visible landscape is believed to affect human beings in many ways, including aesthetic appreciation and health and well-being. The aim of this paper is to analyse the range of landscapes used in environmental psychology studies, and the evidence of health effects related to viewing these landscapes. A literature review of publications linking landscapes and health effects was conducted. This reported evidence of health and well-being effects related to exposure to visual landscapes. The results of the review include an overview of the types of landscape used in the studies, the evidence on health effects, the methods and measures applied and the different groups of respondents. The analysis reveals a predominance of studies using only coarse categories of landscapes. Most landscape representations have been classed as “natural” or “urban”. Few studies were found to use subcategories within these groups. Generally, the natural landscapes gave a stronger positive health effect compared to urban landscapes. Urban landscapes were found to have a less positive and in some cases negative effect on health. Three main kinds of health effects have been identified in the study; short-term recovery from stress or mental fatigue, faster physical recovery from illness and long-term overall improvement on people's health and well-being.The study provides an overview of the relationships between health and landscapes arranged in an accessible format, identifying gaps in our knowledge requiring further research. The identification of quantifiable landscape attributes that affect health is seen as an important factor in enabling future landscape design to be of benefit to human health.
... In today's society, "tourism" is a common way for people to relieve negative emotions (such as stress, fatigue, and depression) and improve their health, quality of life, and well-being [1][2][3][4][5][6]. However, due to physical or cognitive impairment [7,8], long-term care facility (LTCF) residents cannot easily leave their care facilities, let alone participate in tourist activities. ...
... Through the actual experience of VR tourism by LTCF residents, this study uses VR presence as the core concept to explore the factors that may affect the perception of VR presence and discusses how to influence well-being through a state of flow. The specific research aims include the following: (1) to explore the predisposing factors that influence VR presence; (2) to examine how VR presence can be guided into a state of flow when LTCF residents experience VR tourism; (3) to examine the relationship between state of flow and well-being. The results of this study contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the process mechanism of how VR tourism experience improves the well-being of LTCF residents. ...
... In addition, this study also found that "control" is the strongest predictor of presence during the VR tourism experience of LTCF residents. Past studies have suggested that control is an essential determinant of VR presence [2,35,57]. In the present study, before LTCF residents experienced VR tourism, researchers briefly introduced the tourist attractions involved in the activity, which may have increased their familiarity with these attractions. ...
This study investigates the mechanisms of virtual reality (VR) tourism’s impact on the well-being of residents in long-term care facilities (LTCFs). It aims to understand how presence and flow during VR experiences can enhance well-being. This experimental study used a quantitative approach with structured questionnaires to investigate VR experiences among LTCF residents in Taiwan. After obtaining ethical approval, 145 eligible participants from four LTCFs completed a full five-week VR tourism experience. Data collection took place from June to November 2022. This study employed Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) with Smart PLS software to analyze the causal relationships between latent variables. The results confirm that the more vivid the virtual reality image (β = 0.240, p < 0.05), the more immersive the experience (β = 0.267, p < 0.05), the greater the ability to control the experience (β = 0.465, p < 0.001), and the greater the ability to stimulate curiosity during the experience (β = 0.290, p < 0.05), the greater the sense of presence. Increased presence leads to user engagement and a state of flow (β = 0.556, p < 0.001), which is essential for personal hedonia (β = 0.453, p < 0.001) and eudaimonia (β = 0.220, p < 0.001). This study elucidates the mechanisms through which VR tourism experiences enhance well-being among LTCF residents, emphasizing the critical roles of presence and flow in promoting both hedonic and eudaimonic dimensions of well-being.
... Moreover, research has shown that exposure to scenic environments is associated with many positive effects. Exposure to natural environments is shown to be beneficial to our attention span [1,2], our stress management [1,3], and our overall happiness [4]. Scenic landscapes also instill a sense of comfort, tranquility, and safety [5]. ...
... Moreover, research has shown that exposure to scenic environments is associated with many positive effects. Exposure to natural environments is shown to be beneficial to our attention span [1,2], our stress management [1,3], and our overall happiness [4]. Scenic landscapes also instill a sense of comfort, tranquility, and safety [5]. ...
Recent advances in deep learning and Vision-Language Models (VLM) have enabled efficient transfer to downstream tasks even when limited labelled training data is available, as well as for text to be directly compared to image content. These properties of VLMs enable new opportunities for the annotation and analysis of images. We test the potential of VLMs for landscape scenicness prediction, i.e., the aesthetic quality of a landscape, using zero- and few-shot methods. We experiment with few-shot learning by fine-tuning a single linear layer on a pre-trained VLM representation. We find that a model fitted to just a few hundred samples performs favourably compared to a model trained on hundreds of thousands of examples in a fully supervised way. We also explore the zero-shot prediction potential of contrastive prompting using positive and negative landscape aesthetic concepts. Our results show that this method outperforms a linear probe with few-shot learning when using a small number of samples to tune the prompt configuration. We introduce Landscape Prompt Ensembling (LPE), which is an annotation method for acquiring landscape scenicness ratings through rated text descriptions without needing an image dataset during annotation. We demonstrate that LPE can provide landscape scenicness assessments that are concordant with a dataset of image ratings. The success of zero- and few-shot methods combined with their ability to use text-based annotations highlights the potential for VLMs to provide efficient landscape scenicness assessments with greater flexibility.
... Human interaction with nature triggers positively reactions in the human body physiology and psychology (Hamilton & Daily, 2012;Millenium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005;ten Brink et al., 2016). Many studies have reported the beneficial effects of viewing natural landscapes, including stress levels reduction, mood improvement, sense of pleasure, etc. (Velarde et al., 2007). On the other hand, loss of natural landscapes and culturally valued ecosystems is associated with negative effects on societal quality of life, including social disruptions and societal marginalization (Millenium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005;ten Brink et al., 2016). ...
... Visually pleasing or disturbing landscapes generate emotions to the observers. Natural landscapes are linked with attractiveness and preference (Purcell & Lamb, 1998), while constant visual landscape experience implicating nature contributes to health benefits and well-being (Bratman et al., 2012;Velarde et al., 2007). The assessment Is there any pure nature left? ...
... Previous studies in terms of restoration benefits of urban spaces mainly focus on the account of their spatial properties and the visual stimuli. However, other sensory stimuli felt by the auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile systems could also make key impressions on perceived restorativeness [28][29][30]. In fact, due to the rich mix of built elements and human activities, people in the urban environment are more easily exposed to multisensory stimuli rather than single senses [15,19,31]. ...
Rapid urbanization has heightened attention fatigue and physiological stress among urban residents. However, high-density urban construction, mainly covered by streets, squares/plazas, and buildings, in particular, poses a challenge to traditional restoration dominated by green infrasturcture. This research aims to conduct a systematic review of the available body of knowledge regarding the relationship between public urban spaces and restorativeness based on combined multisensory effects. First, a conceptual framework was proposed to connect spatial properties of public realms, sensorial mechanisms, and restoration benefits. As a result, detailed spatial elements and organization affecting multiple sensory modalities combined via additive, antagonistic, and synergistic effects were extracted, which essentially act on urban restoration, including attention, stress, and emotional recovery. Last, but not least, compared with previous research, restoration design strategies of public urban spaces accelerating multisensory integration were drawn to contribute new insights for future high-density urban development.
... Research has shown that contemplating various types of landscapes can have significant health benefits. For instance, Velarde [49] found that daily exposure to green scenery can lead to greater short-term recovery from stress and mental fatigue, faster physical recovery from illness, and overall long-term improvements in health and well-being. In urban settings, landscapes that include trees and green spaces are particularly advantageous, as proximity to visible greenery is linked to enhanced mental health and well-being [50,51]. ...
Simple indicators are often used to summarize the complexity of systems or products, commonly through color-coded labels paired with letters. These labels, like those indicating energy efficiency or nutritional ratings, help users quickly understand essential characteristics. Building on this approach, the Quality Urban Label (QUL) has been developed to assess public space adaptation to urban climate change. The QUL utilizes four key indicators, called quality components: air quality (pollutants), noise pollution, thermal comfort, and visual comfort. It ranges from 0 to 25 and is represented by a color and letter code (green, A, ranging from 0 to 2; blue, B, ranging from 6 to 11; orange, C, ranging from 15 to 19; and red, D, ranging from 22 to 25), with green representing better quality and red poorer quality. The QUL aims to evaluate public spaces based on energy consumption reduction, greenhouse gas emissions reduction, and progress toward carbon neutrality. This article explores some ecological and climate benefits of the QUL, especially in warm Mediterranean cities. An objective label that quantifies the alignment of urban public space with climate neutrality has numerous advantages, which are discussed in the article. In addition, it is a key tool for urban project planning, focused on reducing urban social inequalities and promoting a just energy transition of urban public space.
... The beneficial impacts of nature exposure on well-being are well-established (Martin et al., 2020;Richardson et al., 2021). Existing studies highlight nature's positive influence on three dimensions crucial to overall health (World Health Organization [WHO], 1948): physical well-being (Maller et al., 2006;Velarde et al., 2007), psychological well-being (Hartig et al., 2003;Olafsdottir et al., 2020), and social well-being (Zieris et al., 2023). Both direct and indirect engagements with the natural environment contribute positively to well-being (Orsega-Smith et al., 2004;Rodiek, 2002). ...
The positive impact of nature on human wellbeing is well-established, while lack of access to natural environments can negatively affect mental and physical health. In today's digital age, challenges such as excessive screen time and strained relationships emphasize the need for digital wellbeing and balanced technology use. This study explores the potential of digital technology to extend natural experiences and promote wellbeing. Through a case study of an industry-academia collaboration in India with a leading Asian digital device manufacturer, the concept of "Soulo" was developed to create digital nature experiences that enhance individual wellbeing. Results suggest that digital technology can do more than balance health and technology-it can improve wellbeing by enriching our experiences with nature. This innovative approach demonstrates how digital tools can foster shared, meaningful natural experiences, advancing wellbeing through deeper connections to nature and others, rather than merely serving as elements for balance.
... Williams (1999) argued that therapeutic landscapes are not limited to healing or assisting in the recovery from illness but can also contribute to maintaining health and enhancing well-being. Velarde et al. (2007) proposed that therapeutic landscapes can be defined as places with natural and historical features that sustain health and well-being. Therapeutic landscapes are connected to the concept of "sense of place" in human geography (Satariano, 2019). ...
112 年 12 月 26 日；第一次修正：113 年 1 月 22 日； 第二次修正：113 年 2 月 16 日；接受日期：113 年 3 月 1 日 摘要 農業景觀具心理恢復潛力，也是遊客與農村聯結的重要元素，了解遊客對農業景觀的心 理恢復與地方依附關係有必要性。目前雖有少數知覺恢復性與地方依附關係的文獻，但缺乏 兩者關係一致性之結果與少有兩者關係在農業景觀的調查。因此，本研究以治療性景觀為基 礎，整合注意力恢復和地方依附觀點，提出知覺恢復性、正向情緒、記憶性和地方依附的研 究架構進行調查，也探討正向情緒和記憶性在知覺恢復性與地方依附間的中介角色。以臺東 池上鄉稻田景觀實證，共 406 份有效問卷。結果顯示，除知覺恢復性對地方依附無顯著影響 外，其餘變項間關係皆顯著，正向情緒和記憶性在知覺恢復性與地方依附間扮演完全中介角 色。本研究根據結果提出理論意涵探討及實務建議。 【關鍵字】：知覺恢復、情緒、記憶性、地方依附、注意力恢復理論、鄉村旅遊 Abstract Agricultural landscapes not only possess potential for psychological restoration but also serve as crucial elements bonding visitors' experiences with rural areas. Understanding the psychological restoration and place attachment of visitors to agricultural landscapes is essential. Although there is literature addressing the relationship between perceived restorativeness and place attachment, there is an inconsistency in the results and a gap of previous studies in investigating the relationship between the two in the context of agricultural landscapes. Therefore, based on the foundation of a therapeutic landscapes concept, this study integrates perspectives from Attention Restoration Theory and Place Attachment Theory, proposing a research model that investigates the relationships among perceived restorativeness, positive emotions, memorability, and place attachment. Additionally, it explores the mediating roles of positive emotions and memorability in the relationship between perceived restorativeness and place attachment. The results of structural equation modeling on data from 406 valid questionnaires distributed to visitors visiting paddy fields in Chishang Township, Taitung, Taiwan, indicated that perceived restorativeness has no significant effect on place attachment, while the relationships among the other variables are all significant. Positive emotion and memorability play a fully mediating role in the relationship between perceived restorativeness and place attachment. Based on the research results, this study offers theoretical implications for discussion and provides practical recommendations.
... This study defined perceived health benefits as the improvements in psychological, physical, and social performances that individuals gain through urban forest park leisure. The assessment of health benefits incorporates various metrics, including physiological data such as electromyography values and heart rate variability (Park et al., 2021;Tsao et al., 2022), affective tests, self-reported emotional states, and self-rated health (Velarde et al., 2007;Pietilä et al., 2015). Notably, using questionnaires to evaluate visitors' perceived health benefits offers a rapid and effective method to measure these benefits within leisure destinations. ...
Urban forest park leisure is a significant means for residents to achieve health and well-being, thus possessing high public health value. However, the relationship between visitors’ leisure involvement and perceived health benefits has not been clarified. This study introduced restorative experiences and positive emotions as mediators and place attachment as a psychological moderator, innovatively constructing a stimulus-organism-response-moderator (SORM) integrated model. This moderated mediation model aimed to examine the mechanism through which visitors’ leisure involvement influenced perceived health benefits. A field survey was conducted in Fuzhou National Forest Park in Fujian, China, resulting in the collection of 588 valid questionnaires. The results showed that visitors’ leisure involvement positively impacted restorative experiences and positive emotions. Restorative experiences and positive emotions completely mediated the indirect relationship between visitors’ leisure involvement and perceived health benefits. Place attachment enhanced the impact of restorative experiences on perceived health benefits, thereby positively moderating the mediation effect of restorative experiences. Place attachment also diminished the impact of positive emotions on perceived health benefits, thereby negatively moderating the mediation effect of positive emotions. Therefore, significant differences existed in the psychological processes involved in acquiring perceived health benefits among visitors with different levels of place attachment. Our findings might enrich the existing knowledge of place attachment and forest health benefits, providing valuable references for designing and optimizing urban forest parks.
... They demonstrate that viewing natural environments can alleviate everyday stress (Tyrväinen et al., 2014), improve concentration (Lindemann-Matthies et al., 2021), and reduce mental fatigue (Kuo and Sullivan, 2001). Additionally, experimental and clinical medical research has shown that observing nature can positively impact physiological indicators such as heart rate (Yin et al., 2018), blood pressure (Velarde et al., 2007), and heart rate variability (Kondo et al., 2018), thus producing restorative benefits. While vision is often the primary sense involved in perceptual experience, auditory perception is equally important for identifying restorative benefits. ...
Various auditory and visual factors influence people’s perception and restoration experiences in the spatial environments. However, few studies have treated these factors as a comprehensive system phenomenon to reveal their integrated effects. Therefore, a specific explanation of the primary pathways and factors that contribute to the main effects of park soundscapes and visual features and the resulting perceived restorativeness remains unclear. The study surveyed 861 visitors in five urban parks in China and collected audiovisual information. Using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM), the research explored the direct, indirect, and moderating effects of common audiovisual environments in parks on perceived restorativeness, emotional states, and preferences. The results indicate that most natural-related visual and auditory factors provide direct benefits for people’s perceived restorativeness, emotional state, and preference. Additionally, certain landscape features and types of sound sources, such as trees and water sounds, have indirect effects on activating restoration through preference and emotion mediation. The study also reveals the moderating effects of landscape features and sound source types on emotional and perceived restorativeness. Another noteworthy finding is the significant relationship between bird songs and the positive impact on perceived restorativeness, emotional state, and preference, which is closely related to acoustic quality indicators. These findings offer new insights for creating urban park spaces through visual and auditory interactions.
... Urban green spaces are not only an important part of the urban ecosystem and urban landscape, but are also places for people's daily rest, recreation, and exercise. A large number of studies have confirmed that urban green space, as a kind of "restorative environment", not only enriches the aesthetic experience of people's daily lives, but also effectively alleviates negative emotions and improves their moods, which are significant for promoting both physiological and psychological health [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. The current research on the impact of urban green space on mental health focuses on three main areas: the impact of urban green space as a whole, green and blue spaces, and soundscapes in urban parks on people's emotional health [23][24][25]. ...
The emotional health benefits of urban green space have been widely recognized. Flower borders, as a perennial plant landscape, have gradually become a current form of plant application in urban green spaces due to their rich color configurations. However, the related research primarily focuses on the impact of urban green spaces on public health, with relatively little attention given to how the colors of flower borders affect public emotional health. This study explored the relationship between the flower borders color characteristics and the public emotional health. In this study, 24 sample images were used as experimental materials, which selected based on their color richness and harmony. Additionally, face recognition technology and online random questionnaires were utilized to measure the public basic emotions and pleasure, respectively. The result shows that, based on the HSV color model and expert recommendations, 19 color characteristics were identified. The correlation analysis of the results from the public emotion with these color characteristics revealed that 13 color characteristics correlated with public emotional pleasure. Among them, blue, neutral purple, and low saturation were positively correlated. Through factor analysis, these thirteen color characteristics were summarized and categorized into four common factors (F1–F4), three of which are related to color. They are “low saturation of blue-violet percentage” (F1), “color configuration diversity” (F2), “bright red percentage” (F3), and “base green percentage” (F4), with F1 having the largest variance explained (27.88%). Finally, an evaluation model of color characteristics was constructed based on the variance explained by these four factors, which was demonstrated to effectively predict the level of public emotional pleasure when viewing flower borders. The results shed light on the effects of color characteristics on public emotions and provide new perspectives for subsequent flower border evaluations. Our results provide a valuable reference for future flower border color design, aiming to better improve public emotional health.
... Emotional preference rating methods in research can be used to study psychological stress reduction [67]. Among current research, though, observation, questionnaires, interviews [68,69], and other survey methods are mainly concerned with the behavior and feelings of subjects, and there are fewer studies related to the use of questionnaires for research subject indicators [70,71]. ...
The purpose of this paper is to explore the restorative effects of two unique Urban Green Spaces (UGSs): modern urban parks (MUPs) and classical Chinese gardens (CCGs). Compared to MUPs, little research has been conducted on the potential restorative effects of CCGs. To fill this gap, we collected video clips of various scenes in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, ‘the city of gardens’ in China, and produced video images of CCGs and MUPs representing UGSs. Public ratings of these videos were collected using the Short-Version Revision Repair Scale (SRRS) to analyze the perceived restorative effects and drivers of CCGs and MUPs in combination with landscape elements, which were deeply parsed using computer vision techniques (semantic segmentation techniques) and expert scoring methods. The aim is to enhance the therapeutic effects of CCGs and MUPs. The results indicate that the differences between the two landscape types in terms of their restorative effects are not significant. The videos representing CCGs had a greater standard deviation of restorative effects (a lower level of consensus) compared to the videos depicting MUPs. Deep learning techniques for semantic segmentation combined with expert scoring methods can effectively help us to understand the drivers influencing restorative effects, and we combined our findings to conclude that improved waterscape design is an essential driver for enhancing the perceived restorative effects of CCGs and that decreasing specific artificial modern structures, enhancing vegetation cover, and increasing public exposure to nature are critical to strengthening the restorative effects of both. Hopefully, these findings will improve visitors’ recovery in UGS environments and guide landscape architects to more effectively design healing UGSs.
... This is further supported by a meta-analysis of 32 randomised controlled studies involving more than 2,000 people, which revealed that nature exposure leads to significant increases in positive affect and a small but significant decline in negative affect (McMahan & Estes, 2015). Technologically mediated or virtual exposure to nature has also been associated with increased hedonic wellbeing (Velarde et al., 2007). On the other hand, eudaimonic wellbeing is referred to as the functioning well element of wellbeing and encompasses further components of mental health beyond simply feeling good (Keyes & Annas, 2009). ...
... Den rene naturopplevelsen som vi er på jakt etter kan trolig dokumenteres noe gjennom forbindelsen mellom landskap og helse, som lenge har blitt observert i forskjellige kulturer og samfunn. I en kunnskapsoversikt av over 100 artikler, ble 31 funnet å gi grunnlag for at eksponering for naturlige landskap gir en sterkere positiv helseeffekt sammenliknet med eksponering for urbane landskap (133). ...
... In particular, recent pioneering research provides scientific evidence on the benefits of urban greenery on urban living. It enhances mental and overall human health [11][12][13] by, for instance, facilitating short-term recovery from stress or mental fatigue and accelerating physical recovery from illness [7,14]. It also influences perceptions of a high quality of urban life [15] and even improves performance and job satisfaction among office workers when they have views of nature [16]. ...
The transition towards nature-based cities has increasingly become a central focus in political–environmental agendas and urban design practices, aiming to enhance climate adaptation, urban biodiversity, spatial equilibrium, and social well-being as part of the ongoing socio-ecological urban transition process. Climate adaptation in cities is a complex problem and one of the main collective challenges for society, but the relationships between city managers and citizens as to urban green care still face many challenges. Parks design guided by technical-expert and globalised criteria; inflexibility from bureaucratic inertia; and citizens’ demands to participate in the urban green transition, sometimes without the necessary knowledge or time, are some of the challenges that require further research. In this study, we examine four long-lasting approaches to green-space management in four cities in the Netherlands, ranging from municipality-driven to community-driven management forms, and encompassing diverse spatial configurations of greenery within the urban fabric. Utilising the theoretical lens of the Social–Ecological Systems Framework, we employ a multiple-case-study approach and ethnographic fieldwork analysis to gain a comprehensive understanding of the norms, collective-choice rules, and social conventions embodied in each urban green management arrangement. The purpose of this research is applied, that is, to provide urban managers and decision-makers with a deeper understanding of drivers to promote effective collaborative management approaches, focusing on specific organisational rules that may contribute to more sustained planning and maintenance pathways for urban green spaces, regardless of changes in political leadership or significant external funding sources. The results of the investigated cases show that long-lasting collaborative management of forests and parks has established a set of collective-choice rules for resource transfer between municipalities and citizens, including non-monetary resources (such as pruning-training courses or guided tours that attract tourists and researchers). Additionally, these arrangements have been favoured by the existence of legal norms that enable co-ownership of the land, and monitoring and sanctioning mechanisms that offer a slightly different interpretation from the evidence identified so far in the scientific literature on collective resource management and organisational studies.
... Diving ignites people's curiosity about the water world; breathing, pressure, weightlessness are different from land, driving people to explore the leisure space in water and experience the ultimate sensation of the water world in an "instant." [43] Diving allows individuals to experience the purity of the water world, offering an escape from the immense pressures of work, life, and study, enabling the freeing of oneself to let the mind soar. Diving focuses solely on the world of water, is a "green leisure activity," [44] and has become a new favorite for tourism leisure. ...
Using the method of literature review, within the cultural context of spatial turn, this paper explores the spatial production of diving activities and interprets the cultural significance of the relationship between humans and water. Diving is a survival pattern oriented towards spatial exploration, offering a perspective on human existence, and the harmony between humans and water requires the activation of temporal and spatial wisdom, thus initiating intellectual exploration in this space. Diving activities create a new existential space, allowing people to experience a different world from land life, whose production requires mental vigor. Diving activities construct an existential space different from the world of land life, not only occupying, practicing, and producing spatially in the aquatic world but also engaging in abstract and experiential spatial re-creation, which build an existential space of practice and re-practice from land to sea, where humans and water production and flow in space, and spatial production in diving activities obtains theoretical interpretation.
... Our biological ties to nature may also stem from the fact that people who closely studied nature were able to gather essential information that helped them survive and procreate. Consequently, those genes were predisposed to find nature fascinating (Velarde et al., 2007). ...
The study is being done to explore the impact of the natural landscape on
human health and well-being. Pakistan is full of beautiful landscapes that are being
destroyed rapidly to develop buildings and plazas Results suggested significant outcomes
on human well-being in the context of physical, psychological, and social health in the
presence of landscape and nature. The majority of the population suggested that natural
landscape plays a significant role in their health and well-being which suggests the
importance of landscapes in a country.
... It was employed as a basis for data collection during interviews, as a guide during the data analysis and as a structure for the result presentation. Research has pointed out a need for models, tools and structured approaches for the implementation of research-based knowledge in design processes [81][82][83], as well as the need to identify specific environmental qualities of the outdoors that promote health and well-being [84]. This summarises what QET is intended for [79] and further justifies the use of the tool, which in relation to the purpose of the study was considered to be both relevant and useful. ...
Health-promoting outdoor environments designed for people living with dementia (PLwD) has proved to be an effective non-pharmacological intervention for treatment of symptoms and improved well-being. However, for individuals with Young-Onset Dementia (YOD), who have particular symptoms and needs, the content and design of these environments are underexplored. This study aimed to explore the needs of individuals with YOD in a garden setting, to generate design-related knowledge for ‘dementia-friendly’ outdoor environments, while contributing to the field of Evidence-Based Design (EBD). An 8-week long nature-based program was carried out in Alnarp’s rehabilitation garden, a specifically developed garden based on research from e.g., landscape architecture, environmental psychology and medical science. The study used a triangulation of qualitative methods including six participants with YOD and a multidisciplinary team of five staff members. Content analysis was used for all gathered data, including 17 semi-structured interviews with participants with YOD and with staff. Data collection and analysis was performed based on the evidence-based Quality Evaluation Tool (QET). The study led to a target group adapted version of the QET for people with YOD containing 20 developed environmental qualities for designers to pursue in therapeutic gardens, including the additional quality of Calmness. A progression was noted, as a result of perceived positive effects during the intervention, indicating possible change and development of the group’s needs and preferences in the outdoors.
... Teniendo en cuenta sus respuestas, la sensación de libertad la sentían en el patio, en la hora del recreo, de manera mayoritaria en los alumnos de 4º de ESO. En ese momento, están en contacto con la naturaleza (Velarde et al., 2007), se relacionan con sus amigos, no hay techo que los confine, etc. (Meyers-Levy y Zhu, 2007). En los alumnos de 2º de ESO, esta sensación de libertad la consiguen repartida en distintos espacios; no sólo en el patio. ...
El objetivo de este artículo es revisar los primeros pasos que se pueden dar en un instituto de secundaria para que el espacio escolar pueda ser utilizado como un recurso educativo. En España existen numerosos edificios escolares construidos a partir de la Ley 14/1970, que supuso una reforma educativa. Sin embargo, los centros educativos seguían teniendo aulas compartimentadas a ambos lados de pasillos. En la actualidad, nuevas metodologías de aprendizaje son habituales en los colegios e institutos, pero sigue existiendo una desconexión entre las aulas como espacio físico y el proceso de aprendizaje. Esto hace que los adolescentes no se identifiquen con el entorno escolar. Si conseguimos incorporar la arquitectura del entorno en nuestras sesiones de clase, los alumnos valorarán lo que les rodea, lo harán suyo y lo respetarán. Formaremos personas con un sentido crítico hacia lo edificado y tendremos ciudadanos que podrán colaborar en la construcción de un mundo mejor para todos. Como un primer paso de análisis del edificio educativo, se han llevado a cabo a lo largo de quince meses, distintas actividades usando los sentidos, con alumnos de educación secundaria, con la intención de darles a conocer ese espacio en el que conviven entre semana. El dibujo de un plano de la planta del edificio en distintos momentos del curso ha servido como indicador para identificar aquellas actividades más apropiadas para conocer su entorno, resultando ser aquellas en las que tenía lugar una mayor interacción física entre los alumnos y el espacio, las elegidas.
... Green spaces are part of urban space and have shaped It has long been a human need to help reduce stress and improve Psychological, physical, and mental health. In the time of the pandemic, it has changed These areas were transformed into security isolation areas, and this was a challenge in terms of Controlling the transmission of Covid-19 in the outdoor environment [ 40 ] Naturally, the trend in sanitary design will be to Providing green spaces, as many studies have dealt with the importance of visual contact with nature enhances health The physical and psychological health of individuals [41]. Rezoning green spaces and parks inside cities. Designers may need to create more spaces and practices for individual use in planning green spaces, such as expanding running paths and paying attention to small neighborhood gardens, as one of the new solutions that provide for individuals to enjoy public parks, they do what is called circles social distance. ...
... Urban life brings along with loads of stress involving work pressure, pollution, interpersonal relationships, and various other stressors while also limiting people to closed rooms and clumped-up spaces irritating the state of mind, as observed in daily life. All these drives the urge of urban citizens to escape into the wilderness for therapeutic health benefits and relief from anxiety and strain (Knopf, 1983;Ulrich et al., 1991;Kaplan, 1995;Frumkin, 2001;Lee et al., 2011Mao et al., 2012;Tsunetsugu et al., 2013;Ochiai et al., 2015;Bang et al., 2017;Velarde et al., 2007;Neff et al., 2018;Song et al., 2018;Yu et al., 2018;Lyu et al., 2019;Kim at al., 2020). Natural environments also provide an improved physiological and emotional environment improving human attitude or mood than urban scapes (Hartig & Staats, 2003;Morita et al., 2006). ...
The current study deals with the (1) perspectives of and (2) benefits to local communities neighbouring the Kaziranga National Park to various aspects of ecosystem services. The study involved interviewing participants to know their perspective on utilities of services provided by the protected area in their daily living, health, psychology, and livelihood. The above-mentioned investigation was carried out between the years 2018 and 2021. It consisted of 749 semi-structured interviews carried out in 21 different villages in the Bokakhat and Kaliabor Circle adjacent to Kaziranga National Park. Every household served as a sampling unit. The villages were chosen based on how likely they were to use non-timber forest products and how dependent they were on the ecosystem services of the forest to support their livelihood. Through group discussions and semi-structured interviews, the eldest members of the household provided most of the information on the use of NTFP extraction and perceptions of the benefits of ecosystem services. The respondent's demographic information was also recorded. Results showed a very positive attitude of locals towards protecting and conserving the protected area for better livelihood, health, and psychological benefits. Based on this study, this paper also discusses the role of Provisioning and Cultural Ecosystem Services of Kaziranga National Park in supporting human health and well-being. OVERVIEW Ecosystem Services (ES) are significant contributors to the health and well-being of human beings. It is broadly categorized as Provisioning Services, Regulating Services, Supporting Services, and Cultural Services (MEA, 2005) with the majority being offered by forest variations. Provisioning services such as NTFPs (food, seeds, fruits, fodders, fuel wood, medicine, natural fibres, etc.) and timbers delivered by the forest act as a resource to local communities to sustain a livelihood, whereas cultural services (such as spiritualism, entertainment, aesthetics, etc) improve the quality of life of the communities. Regulating services supports humans by regulating the key components or processes of the ecosystem such (as carbon sequestration, climate modulation, water cycle, amelioration of infectious diseases, etc.) while forests also provide supporting services that significantly support humans by promoting production and/or maintenance of all other ecosystem services. These are the fundamental processes that support the services and functioning of any ecosystem. Forest ecosystem services (FESs) promote natural ecosystem health and improve the health and well-being of the human population residing in the vicinity. Although, forests are spread across all terrestrial biomes of the earth, viz.
... Previous studies on perceived naturalness of urban green spaces have mainly used photographs for visual perception investigate the relationship between visual perception and preference (Hofmann et al. 2012;Carrus et al. 2013;Hoyle et al. 2019). However, it's important to note that environmental perception involves multiple senses and is not limited to just one sense (Ulrich 1979;Velarde et al. 2007). Using only photographs may restrict judgments based on other senses and could result in cognitive bias, where familiar spaces are evaluated more positively (Carrus et al. 2013). ...
... If urban environments were researched, they were often part of the urban vs. nature dichotomy. Studies failed to reflect on the diversity found in both types of environments, leading to an overestimation of the restorative value of some natural environments and the underestimation of the restorative value of some urban settings (Staats 2012); for example, beautiful parks were compared with back alleys or parking lots giving a distorted image (Velarde et al. 2007, Korpela 2013. As a result, most research focuses on the restorative potential of natural environments, and less is known about how to design restorative urban spaces. ...
... In addition to the above four themes closely related to the ART, we also noticed another theme during the preliminary coding process that was very obvious and recurring-"Biophilia". A biophilic design refers to the creation of artificial environments that evoke human biophilic nature through the recreation, use, and simulation of natural elements, drawing inspiration from nature [38]. ...
Currently, university students are facing high levels of stress and negativity. Creating a campus learning environment that promotes students’ physical and mental health and well-being has become a key focus of current research. There is now a wealth of research proving that the natural attributes of learning spaces are highly restorative for university students, both physically and mentally. In order to comprehensively clarify the characteristics of the library spatial environment that has a restorative effect on university students, this paper conducted semi-structured interviews with 50 university students and thematically analyzed the data obtained from these interviews. Ultimately, we identified five key themes: (1) Being away: students believe that studying alone is a way to escape social pressures, immersing themselves in their studies helps them forget everything around them, and the view from the window creates a sense of detachment; (2) Extent: students perceive the design of the library space as rich and orderly; (3) Fascination: many elements of the library spatial environment appeal to them and make them feel energized. The overall atmosphere motivates them to engage more actively in their learning; (4) Compatibility: the library spatial environment provides a variety of facilities that meet their learning needs, along with various types of spaces catering for different behaviors; and (5) Biophilia: Many interviewees mentioned the benefits of natural environments and timber, as well as their preference for spaces with a sufficient sense of enclosure and the ability to observe others. The first four themes were found to be closely related to the Attention Restorative Theory during the course of the study, while the last theme was mentioned by most of the students. The results of this study prove that library spaces can be described as restorative environments in the same way as natural environments, with both physical and mental restorative effects. Furthermore, the results of this study can also provide certain ideas for the design and renovation of the internal spatial environment of university libraries.
... Since the late twentieth century, numerous research theories emerged regarding the "healing garden concept", offering valuable design guidance for practitioners across various disciplines, including architecture. Ulrich (1984), Velarde et al. (2007), and Bratman et al. (2012) demonstrated the positive impact of incorporating natural elements such as greenery, water features, and sunlight in healing environments. Marcus investigated the arrangement of different types of healing gardens, such as courtyards, terraces, viewing gardens, and roof gardens, and how these spaces can influence user engagement for well-being (Marcus & Barnes, 1999;Marcus, Sachs, & Ulrich, 2014). ...
Healing gardens, a longstanding feature of medical institutions, have garnered attention from scholars for their
health-promoting properties across various stages of research. Through a historical literature review and
contemporary case analysis of healing gardens, this research investigates how to achieve therapeutic integration
by fostering effective connections between buildings and nature through typological design. Combined with
qualitative and design-driven research methodologies, including the use of visualization tools such as drawings,
models, and images, six models of building-nature integration in contemporary healthcare architecture are
identified. This article bridges a research gap in the field of healing garden design and concludes by demonstrating
that “typology” is only a design strategy according to context and building performance. In addition to
positions of healing gardens, critical factors such as spatial organization, aesthetics, and sustainability, incorporating
elements such as accessibility, readability, comfort, and ecological factors, must be carefully considered
to achieve integration.
Designing barrier-free urban space for disabled or elderly citizens has become a central topic in both Germany and China. Guidelines and planning regulations have already found their way into design practice, yet sometimes fail to deliver practicable and convenient solutions for affected groups. Especially in China, other urban trends, e.g. increase of individual car ownership, the recent bike-sharing boom or food delivery services, have led to fierce competition over the use public space with clear disadvantages for mobility-impaired groups. Also in Germany, barrier-free routes often find interruptions and obstacles, hindering self-determined mobility. In urban planning and design processes, the voices of affected individuals are often not fully recognised, as other interest groups dominate or lead the discussion. A Sino-German research team at Tongji University, under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Chen Zheng, has developed a new quantification approach for affective mapping based on biological feedback to measure individual positive and negative perception of urban environments. This technique allows to analyse urban space based on target group specific affection and can help to design better places, which are accessible, safe and easy to orientate for everyone. It gives a voice to underrepresented groups in planning participation and supports the recognition of needs for mobility-impaired citizens. The article will discuss the situations mobility-impaired groups face in Germany and China and outlines innovative considerations for future planning and design practice.
Research indicates that even short duration space flight may cause deficits to psychological health. Crewed members of spaceflights are also vulnerable to various neurobehavioral problems, which may reduce psychological health, work efficiency and group cohesiveness. Mindfulness meditation as a psychological countermeasure for long-term space missions has received increasing attention. Mindfulness techniques have been shown to provide various cognitive and affective benefits in clinical settings, these have yet to be employed as a feasible psychological countermeasure for space crews. Therefore, this paper will propose that the use of mindfulness-based intervention may offer a feasible adjunct countermeasure for several psychological and performance risks for astronauts during long-term space missions.
Wetland parks are an important part of urban ecosystems, characterized by artificial and natural features. While providing outdoor recreational space for urban residents, the aesthetics of the landscape also affect residents’ willingness to visit the wetland park. Previous studies of wetland parks focused on the ecological benefit. However, fewer systematic studies analyzed the aesthetic qualities and influencing elements of wetland parks. In this study, the Wuping Qianlu Lake Wetland Park in Fujian Province, China was used to evaluate the landscape visual quality of the wetland park using the the Scenic Beauty Estimation method (SBE), and the landscape features of the wetland park were obtained through the Semantic Differential (SD) method and semantic segmentation technique. The regression model of landscape visual quality and landscape features in wetland parks was established using SBE values as the dependent variable, and 23 landscape features as independent variables. The SBE values and accessibility were also combined to create four quadrants, which were combined with K-means clustering to diagnose existing problems. The results of the study showed that two landscape features, approach and proportion of water area were weaker among the four types of wetland park landscapes. The SBE values of the man-made landscape type were the most significant. Meanwhile, the high enclosure landscape type had a significant sense of rusticity, accentuating the wildness of the plants. It was less aesthetically pleasing and had the poorest landscape visual quality of the four types. This study provides a systematic method for diagnosing landscape problems in wetland parks, evaluating landscape visual quality assessment, and providing theoretical and technical support for urban wetland park renewal and construction.
Purpose
In order to determine whether the factors affecting office worker well-being are location dependent, this exploratory study analyses the relative importance of different “building well-being” factors for prime office workers in two leading but environmentally contrastive real estate markets: London and Hong Kong.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper adopts a mixed methods sequential explanatory design (follow-up explanations model), consisting of three phases: an exploratory phase to refine the building well-being factors, a quantitative phase utilising a questionnaire to assess the relative importance of these building well-being factors ( N = 281: London = 171; Hong Kong = 110), followed by a final phase of follow-up interviews with respondents to explore the reasons behind the significant differences observed in the quantitative phase ( N = 13: London = 7; Hong Kong = 6).
Findings
While London and Hong Kong share some highly-ranking factors in common, significant differences in importance are observed for 17 of the 31 identified factors as a result of contrasting physical, economic, and cultural environments.
Originality/value
Despite growing recognition of the importance of the built environment on well-being, to the authors’ knowledge there has been no previous research investigating how building well-being demands may vary systematically across geographies. Understanding these differences has important implications for interpreting building well-being research, effective business operations, real estate investment, building certification scheme design, and governance of the built environment.
While the life expectancy of older people has increased significantly, this is often related to more long-term care in healthcare residences and nursing homes. Staying in these facilities can lead to a reduction in the sense of connection with others and the world around, as well as in vigor, with significant psychophysical repercussions in the long term. Although previous studies have shown that the virtual nature can benefit both, there are no significant studies that have tested its effect in generating these positive outcomes in the older population. Therefore, our study sought to investigate, in a sample of 53 older people in care at a nursing home or healthcare residence, the indirect effect of a 3D built virtual arctic environment (vs. a 3D built virtual urban environment) exposure in virtual reality on vigor through connectedness. Both the virtual scenarios were designed with a first-person view, with no translation around the environment and only in-situ rotation. Results highlighted that exposure to the 3D built virtual arctic environment leads to higher connectedness than the 3D built virtual urban environment, and this, in turn, leads to an increase in vigor. Findings were discussed based on the potential of adopting virtual nature in facilities to improve older people’s sense of connectedness and, in turn, improve their well-being.
Optimizing the visual, thermal, and acoustic environments of urban public spaces in severely cold regions can significantly enhance the psychological restoration of the elderly, addressing the increasing mental health demands in an aging society. Despite its importance, the mechanisms, strategies, and seasonal effects of various environmental variables on psychological restoration remain inadequately studied. This research uses Harbin as a case study, employing field surveys and tests to systematically examine the elderly’s psychological restoration across different seasons. By integrating environmental stimulus variables with a psychological restoration evaluation model, the study investigates the impact of urban public spaces on mental health. The key findings are: (1) The spring environment of urban public spaces has the most significant positive effect on psychological restoration, with an effect size of η2 = 0.360. (2) A significant correlation exists between environmental variables and psychological restoration year-round, with the panoramic green view index in winter showing the highest positive impact (correlation coefficient = 0.301, p < 0.01). (3) The influence of environmental stimulus variables on psychological restoration varies notably across seasons; the acoustic environment in spring contributes most significantly, with an R2 = 17.03%, while visual factors dominate in winter and summer. (4) Conditional probability analysis reveals the effects of various environmental variables on psychological restoration, proposing season-specific environment optimization strategies. Based on these findings, the paper presents a model for optimizing urban public space environments in severely cold regions, aiming to maximize elderly psychological restoration by tailoring environmental stimulus variables to their mental health needs.
The production of ornamental plants and floriculture is by far the most diverse sector of horticulture. Relying on a long tradition of cultivar selection and improvement, highly specialized subsectors have emerged. The ornamental horticulture comprises two parts, viz. ornamental plants which encompasses a wide array of plants and includes the production and marketing of herbaceous plants, bedding plants, flowering plants, foliage plants or houseplants, cut cultivated greens, and cut flowers and landscape gardening industry that involves the cultivation, maintenance of plants, and beautification of an area. Ornamental horticulture and landscape gardening has blossomed into commercial activity with considerable growth and a useful crop diversification option, particularly for small farmers over the past three decades. The ornamental industry has witnessed commendable changes with the growth of cities, population explosion, and with the growing habit of “saying it with flowers.” Due to the changing lifestyle, the present-day ornamental and landscape industry has become one of the most dynamic and fast-growing sectors with a significant rate of growth and achievement during the past few years and has extended worldwide with the major production centers shifting, i.e., from developed to developing countries.
Although greenspace exposure has physiological health benefits, there is insufficient research on the threshold effect of health benefits in typical urban landscapes. Here we selected five typical urban landscapes (open greenspace, semi-closed greenspace, closed greenspace, bluespace, grey space) in 15 urban parks in Xiamen, China, and applied the physiological health threshold model to calculate the efficiency threshold and benefit threshold of greenspace exposure by continuously monitoring the changes of two physiological indicators-electroencephalography (EEG) and heart rate (HR). (1) The EEG threshold results show that compared with greenspace exposure, bluespace exposure can reach the physiological health efficiency threshold faster (4-5 min) but does not show an advantage in terms of benefit threshold. The more open the greenspace, the faster it can reach the efficiency threshold (5-6 min), but the higher the canopy density of the (closed) greenspace, the shorter the time to reach the efficiency threshold (8-9 min). (2) The HR threshold shows that bluespace and open greenspace are the fastest to reach the efficiency threshold (1 min), with the remaining greenspace reaching it after 6-7 min. The benefit threshold was reached faster in the bluespace (11 min) than in the greenspace (18-21 min), and the degree of openness of the greenspace has no significant effect on the speed of benefit thresholds. (3) Combining the results of EEG and HR thresholds, it can be seen that bluespace is better at reducing stress, while open greenspace can reach efficiency thresholds more quickly. This study confirms the physiological health threshold model, offering a reference for urban greenspace planning to enhance residents' stress management and health.
The Attention Restoration Theory (ART) proposed four essential indicators (being away, extent, fascinating, and compatibility) for understanding urban and natural restoration quality. However, previous studies have overlooked the impact of spatial structure (the visual relationships between scene entities) and neighboring environments on restoration quality as they mostly relied on isolated questionnaires or images. This study introduces a spatial-dependent graph neural networks (GNNs) approach to address this gap and explore the relationship between spatial structure and restoration quality at a city scale. Two types of graphs were constructed: street-level graphs using sequential street view images (SVIs) to capture visual relationships between entities and represent spatial structure, and city-level graphs modeling the topological relationships of roads to capture the spatial features of neighboring entities, integrating perceptual, spatial, and socioeconomic features to measure restoration quality. The results demonstrated that spatial-dependent GNNs outperform traditional models, achieving an accuracy (Acc) of 0.742 and an F1 score of 0.740, indicating their exceptional ability to capture features of adjacent spaces. Ablation experiments further revealed the substantial positive impact of spatial structure features on the predictive performance for restoration quality. Moreover, the study highlighted the greater significance of naturally relevant entities (e.g., trees) compared to artificial entities (e.g., buildings) in relation to high restoration quality. This study clarifies the association between spatial structure and restoration quality, providing a new perspective to improve urban well-being in the future.
Most of the current soundscape research content is limited to the discussion of the restoration effect of single-element soundscapes, but it is the combination of sounds that is common in outdoor activities, and there is no evidence that the restoration of natural soundscapes is better with multi-element combinations. In this study, the Zhangjiajie National Forest Park in China was used as the research object, and the physiological indices of the subjects were collected through electroencephalogram signals, and the POMS short-form psychological scale was used to understand the subjective psychological responses of the subjects to the soundscape. The results showed that (1) The psychophysiological restorative ability of the natural soundscape of the National Forest Park was confirmed, and the subjects’ psychological and physiological indices changed significantly and positively after listening to each section of the natural soundscape (p = 0.001). (2) The restorative effect of the multi-natural sound combination was ranked first in the overall ranking of the five natural soundscapes, and the multi-natural sound combination did indeed provide better restorative effects than the single-element sounds. (3) Gender does not usually have a significant effect on the restoration effect, and only Windy Sound among the four single-element nature sound landscapes and one multi-element combination of nature sound landscapes showed a significant gender difference, so in general, the effect of gender on the restoration effect of nature sound landscapes is not significant. In terms of research methodology, this study used cluster analysis to cluster the five types of natural soundscapes according to psychological and physiological recovery ability, and used ridge regression to construct mathematical models of the psychological and physiological recovery of each of the four natural soundscapes. The study of human physiological and psychological recovery from different types of natural soundscapes in China’s national forest parks will provide a basis for soundscape planning, design, and policy formulation in national forest parks.
Global environmental and health issues such as climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic have highlighted the weaknesses of current urban systems, including the poor availability and accessibility of green and public spaces in cities. Nature-based Solutions are configured as promising solutions to increase the resilience and health of the built environment by addressing climate and pandemic issues, promoting the psycho-physical well-being of users and proposing solutions for the protection of the environment and ecosystems. Following a systematic review of the scientific literature using the PRISMA methodology, this study aims to provide a taxonomic framework for Nature-based Solutions for the built environment that is applicable to the urban and building scales, highlighting key benefits in addressing pandemic and climate challenges and achieving urban resilience. This framework proposes a holistic and multifunctional approach that will prove to be a useful tool for researchers and policy makers to incorporate greening strategies into urban regeneration and redevelopment processes. The application of Nature-based Solutions still seems to be limited. It is therefore necessary to raise awareness of this issue among citizens and policy makers and to promote close cooperation between the different actors in territorial decision-making processes.
Matsue City in Japan, known as the "City of Water," has historically celebrated its urban waterways for their scenic beauty. However, due to factors like rapid urbanization, an aging population, and recent isolation challenges, these waterways have lost their prominence. This research aims to understand the visual impression of Matsue City's waterways and their connection to the city. Our approach involves a mixed data collection method. We mapped physical elements along the waterways, categorized them, and analysed the results. We also captured photos of the sceneries, examining their composition using photo segmentation. Additionally, a photographic questionnaire was conducted with respondents familiar with these areas, cross-referencing their responses with interviews that included renderings of the sceneries. The outcomes reveal insights into the visual appeal of urban waterways and their impact on inhabitants. By identifying elements that resonate and understanding shortcomings in the current landscape, our research contributes to revitalization efforts. The findings emphasize the potential of Matsue City's historical waterways for sustainable development strategies, highlighting the importance of preserving and enhancing these natural assets for the benefit of residents and the city's overall development.
The importance of urban parks for improving the quality of life of residents is becoming increasingly clear as people interact less and less with nature. Urban parks should be designed to have a profound impact on the mental health and well-being of citizens through the provision of high-quality facilities and services. Nevertheless, there are differences in the influencing factors in urban parks. Nowadays, urban parks as the lungs of cities are considered important destinations for citizens to get rid of stress and mental fatigue. Therefore, it is important to understand what factors contribute to people feeling mentally better and improving their well-being. Based on people’s experiences and opinions, the present study aims to investigate how urban parks as nature-based solutions in Marivan City, Iran, especially the green infrastructure and its elements in Shano and Zaribar Parks, contribute to respondent’s mental health and overall well-being. The necessary data for this study were collected from 277 respondents using a questionnaire. The questionnaire was randomly distributed both in person and online. The questions were categorized based on 3 indicators directly related to mental health and well-being: perceptual, visual, and functional. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling in Smart-PLS software. Results indicate that the perceptual, visual, and functional indicators in Marivan’s urban parks have a significant impact on the mental health and well-being of residents. Among these indicators, the visual indicator has shown the highest level of influence.
This study delves into an investigation of urban public outdoor spaces (POSs) from a health-oriented perspective, recognizing varied health needs encompassing physical, psychological, social, and environmental aspects. In this study, POSs of two typical government service centers (GSCs) were analyzed based on their structure, user demographics, and user satisfaction, revealing several problems with the current GSC POS designs. To address these problems, principles for GSC POS design were proposed for natural, playing, and social spaces and applied to redesign the Wuchang GSC. Firstly, through on-site surveys, questionnaire surveys, and data analysis, the existing problems in promoting residents’ health in the GSC POSs were revealed, such as the insufficient greening of natural spaces, lack of interest in playing spaces, and unreasonable design of the scale of social spaces. Based on the above analysis, a health design optimization principle based on Maslow’s theory is proposed. Firstly, improvement solutions were proposed and implemented for green spaces, such as using more diversified natural elements, zone differentiation, and landscape improvements to promote the health of users. Secondly, the leisure and sports needs of different age groups can be met simultaneously by diversifying the layout and functional settings of playing spaces. Finally, public spaces suitable for social interaction were redesigned to promote the psychological health of citizens in social activities by optimizing the scale of communication spaces. The proposed design optimization strategies for GSCs not only provide theoretical support for the healthy design of POSs but also provide useful references for the healthy development of urban public spaces.
Research suggests that the formation of neighborhood social ties (NSTs) may substantially depend on the informal social contact which occurs in neighborhood common spaces, and that in inner‐city neighborhoods where common spaces are often barren no‐man's lands, the presence of trees and grass supports common space use and informal social contact among neighbors. We found that for 145 urban public housing residents randomly assigned to 18 architecturally identical buildings, levels of vegetation in common spaces predict both use of common spaces and NSTs; further, use of common spaces mediated the relationship between vegetation and NSTS. In addition, vegetation and NSTs were significantly related to residents' senses of safety and adjustment. These findings suggest that the use and characteristics of common spaces may play a vital role in the natural growth of community, and that improving common spaces may be an especially productive focus for community organizing efforts in inner‐city neighborhoods.
緑地の視覚心理的効果を明らかにするために, 本実験では生垣, ブロック塀, さらに緑量的にそれらの中間的な段階の視覚対象として樹木とブロックの比が2:5, 4:3, 5:2となる場合の5つの対象物をみたときの脳波, 特にα波β波について分析を行った。 その結果, α波とβ波の合計値に占めるα波の割合が, ブロックに対する樹木の割合が半分以上になると高くなる傾向を示した。 一般に, 安静時にはα波が増え, 緊張時にはβ波が増えると言われていることから, この傾向はブロックが緊張感をもたらし, 樹木はそれを和らげる効果があることを示唆するものであることが明らかになった。
The findings suggest that stressed individuals feel significantly better after exposure to nature scenes rather than to American urban scenes lacking nature elements. Compared to the influences of the urban scenes, the salient effect of the nature exposures was to increase Positive Affect — including feelings of affection friendliness, playfulness, and elation. The increase in positive affect produced by the nature scenes is consistent with the finding that the nature exposures also significantly reduced Fear Arousal. According to psychological theories, a reduction in arousal or activation produces pleasurable feelings if an individual is experiencing stress or excessive arousal (Berlyne, 1971, pp. 81–82). In contrast to the nature scenes, the urban views tended to work against emotional well‐being. The major effect of the urban scenes was to significantly increase Sadness. There was also a consistent but non‐significant tendency for the urban scenes to‐aggravate feelings of Anger/Aggression, and for the nature scenes to reduce such feelings. The urban exposures also held the attention of subjects somewhat less effectively than the nature exposures. These findings were stable across sexes, and applied to subjects who had grown up in either rural or urban environments.
Research has shown that people typically give high aesthetic preference ratings to trees with spreading canopies, similar to those found on the African savanna. If the savanna hypothesis is correct, people likely will have strong emotional responses to such trees as well. In this study, preferences and emotional responses of 206 participants to viewing scenes with different tree forms and urban elements were examined. Slide images of spreading, rounded, or columnar trees, or inanimate objects in two urban scenes were created. As expected, participants found scenes with trees more attractive than scenes with inanimate objects, and they rated spreading trees more attractive than rounded or columnar trees. Participants reported more positive emotions when viewing trees compared to inanimate objects, and they were happier when viewing spreading trees compared with other tree forms. These results are consistent with the savanna hypothesis, with emotional responses relating to preferences for trees with spreading forms.
Although vegetation has been positively linked to fear of crime and crime in a number of settings, recent findings in urban residential areas have hinted at a possible negative relationship: Residents living in "greener" surroundings report lower levels of fear, fewer incivilities, and less aggressive and violent behavior. This study used police crime reports to examine the relationship between vegetation and crime in an inner-city neighborhood. Crime rates for 98 apartment buildings with varying levels of nearby vegetation were compared. Results indicate that although residents were randomly assigned to different levels of nearby vegetation, the greener a building's surroundings were, the fewer crimes reported. Furthermore, this pattern held for both property crimes and violent crimes. The relationship of vegetation to crime held after the number of apartments per building, building height, vacancy rate, and number of occupied units per building were accounted for.
Subjects viewed sixty color slides of either (1) nature with water, (2) nature dominated by vegetation, or (3) urban environments without water or vegetation. The information rates of the three slide samples were equivalent. Measurements were taken of the effects of the slide presentations on alpha amplitude, heart rate, and emotional states. Results revealed several significant differences as a function of environment, which together indicate that the two categories of nature views had more positive influences on psychophysiological states than the urban scenes. Alpha was significantly higher during the vegetation as opposed to urban slides; similarly, alpha was higher on the average when subjects viewed water rather than urban content. There was also a consistent pattern for nature, especially water, to have more positive influences on emotional states. A salient finding was that water, and to a lesser extent vegetation views, held attention and interest more effectively than the urban scenes. Implications of the findings for theory development in environmental aesthetics are discussed.
S. Kaplan suggested that one outcome of mental fatigue may be an increased propensity for outbursts of anger and even violence. If so, contact with nature, which appears to mitigate mental fatigue, may reduce aggression and violence. This study investigated that possibility in a setting and population with relatively high rates of aggression: inner-city urban public housing residents. Levels of aggression were compared for 145 urban public housing residents randomly assigned to buildings with varying levels of nearby nature (trees and grass). Attentional functioning was assessed as an index of mental fatigue. Residents living in relatively barren buildings reported more aggression and violence than did their counterparts in greener buildings. Moreover, levels of mental fatigue were higher in barren buildings, and aggression accompanied mental fatigue. Tests for the proposed mechanism and for alternative mechanisms indicated that the relationship between nearby nature and aggression was fully mediated through attentional functioning.
All over the world there is an increasing interest in research results showing the impact of the physical environment on people's health and well-being. The realization that good design, both indoors and outdoors, not only generates functional efficiency but also strengthens and improves health processes has given rise to a new branch of architecture, called Design and Health (Dilani, 2001). Knowledge and awareness of how good design as well as bad design may influence people's well-being is increasing among architects as well as among interior decorators and landscape architects. An expression of design and health in landscape architecture is to be found in the movement around healing gardens, i.e. gardens that in different ways may influence the visitor in a positive way (Cooper Marcus & Barnes, 1999). In Sweden today, the concept of healing has several connotations, some quite concrete, others more spiritual and mental. Generally speaking, however, healing may be said to be a process that promotes overall well-being (Cooper Marcus & Barnes, 1999). In medical anthropology the individual's personal, subjective experience of recovery is also emphasized (Janzen, 2002). It is in other words equally important that the illness is cured in a purely medical respect and that the individual experiences a personal feeling of recovery. Is it, then, possible for a garden to be anything else than healing? Is not the aspect of healing woven into the very concept of garden? Myths all over the world depict the garden as an enclosed and safe place where one takes refuge to find shelter, comfort, and relief from sorrow and pain (Prest, 1988;
During the past 20 years, findings have indicated that nature plays an active role in helping people recover from stress and fatigue. Two of the most cited theories in this field are Rachel and Stephen Kaplan's theory of recovery from Directed Attention Fatigue in nature and Roger Ulrich's theory of aesthetic and affective responses to natural environments and stress recovery. One aim of the present study is to test whether being outdoors in a green recreational environment causes people to be more focused, compared to being in a room indoors (in line with hypotheses suggested by the Kaplans). Another aim is to test whether people experience stress reduction, i.e. as evidenced by changes in blood pressure and heart rate, if they are placed in an environment with many green elements (in line with hypotheses suggested by Ulrich). The overall study design is that of an intervention study. Fifteen elderly persons living at a home for very elderly people participated. Their powers of concentration, blood pressure and heart rate were measured before and after an hour of rest in a garden or in an indoor setting. Seven elderly people were randomly chosen to have their first series of tests in a garden, while eight elderly people had their first series of tests indoors. The results indicate that powers of concentration increase for very elderly people after a visit to a garden outside the geriatric home in which they live, compared to that after resting indoors in their favourite room. The results did not show any effects on blood pressure or heart rate. It is suggested that having a one-hour rest outdoors in a garden setting plays a role in elderly people's powers of concentration, and could thereby affect their performance of activities of daily living. One important factor in this study was that both the outdoor environment and the indoor environment at the home were highly valued by participants.
Examined whether the presence of nearby nature might lend urban public housing residents the psychological resources to grapple with the challenges facing them. More specifically, it examines whether natural elements in the public housing outdoor environment—trees and grass—can assist in restoring the very psychological resources likely to be depleted in the struggle against poverty. In 145 urban public housing residents randomly assigned to buildings with and without nearby nature, attentional functioning and effectiveness in managing major life issues were compared. Residents living in buildings without nearby trees and grass reported more procrastination in facing their major issues and assessed their issues as more severe, less soluble, and more longstanding than did their counterparts living in greener surroundings. Mediation tests and extensive tests for possible confounds supported the attention restoration hypothesis—that green space enhances residents' effectiveness by reducing mental fatigue. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Environmental preferences vary with the environments evaluated and the people who evaluated them. When research has considered the explanatory power of person variables, it has focused on traits or demographic characteristics. Little research has considered how environmental preferences vary with regularly occurring psychological states, such as attentional fatigue. In this experiment, we investigated the need for psychological restoration as a within-individual determinant of the common preference differential between natural and urban environments. We treated preference as an attitude, constituted of beliefs about the likelihood of restoration during a walk in a given environment and the evaluation of restoration given different restoration needs. College students (N=103) completed the procedure just before a morning lecture (less fatigue condition) or immediately after an afternoon lecture, which itself followed the passage of time and other activities over the day (more fatigue condition). In both fatigue conditions, participants reported more favorable attitudes toward a walk in a forest than a walk in a city center, but this difference was larger with the more fatigued. This result apparently owes to the more fatigued participants’ more positive evaluation of attentional recovery, and a greater judged likelihood of restoration when walking in the forest.
We used a direct rating approach based on definitions of each construct to measure the four components of a restorative environment proposed by attention restoration theory (ART): being away, extent, fascination, and compatibility. We used the same approach to measure two criterion variables, perceived restorative potential (PRP) of a setting and preference for the setting, as well as four additional predictor variables (openness, visual access, movement ease, and setting care). Each participant rated 70 settings, 35 each from urban and natural environments, for only one of the variables. Mean ratings were higher for the natural than the urban settings for both criterion variables and all four restorative components, with differences significant in all cases except for fascination. Correlations across settings generally followed the predictions of ART, but collinearity appeared among several sets of variables, most notably being away and setting category, PRP and preference, and extent and fascination. Despite these problems, regression analysis showed that being away and compatibility predicted PRP and that the pattern of prediction for PRP and preference was somewhat different. r 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
Research suggests that the formation of neighborhood social ties (NSTs) may substantially depend on the informal social contact which occurs in neighborhood common spaces, and that in inner-city neighborhoods where common spaces are often barren no-man's lands, the presence of trees and grass supports common space use and informal social contact among neighbors. We found that for 145 urban public housing residents randomly assigned to 18 architecturally identical buildings, levels of vegetation in common spaces predict both use of common spaces and NSTs; further, use of common spaces mediated the relationship between vegetation and NSTS. In addition, vegetation and NSTs were significantly related to residents' senses of safety and adjustment. These findings suggest that the use and characteristics of common spaces may play a vital role in the natural growth of community, and that improving common spaces may be an especially productive focus for community organizing efforts in inner-city neighborhoods.
Attention Restoration Theory (ART) proposes that effortful directed attention can become fatigued in modern urban environments. Restoration can occur in a setting that evokes fascination (effortless attention). Ordinary natural settings evoke soft fascination, that is, moderate fascination accompanied by esthetic pleasure. Such settings enable a fully restorative experience, including the recovery of directed attention and the opportunity for serious reflection. Settings broadly classified as sports/entertainment are more likely to evoke hard fascination, that is, very high levels of fascination that fill the mind. Such settings permit directed attention recovery but afford little opportunity for reflection. We tested these ideas by having participants rate the perceived restorative effectiveness of three kinds of settings (ordinary natural, sports/entertainment, and everyday urban) under two goal-set conditions (as places for attentional recovery or for reflection). Ordinary natural settings were seen as having the highest overall restorative effectiveness, everyday urban settings as having the lowest, and sports/entertainment settings as in between. Moreover, sports/entertainment settings were seen as higher in restorative effectiveness for the attentional-recovery goal set than for the reflection goal set. No such goal-set difference occurred for the other two setting categories combined. These results are in agreement with the predictions of ART.
Our purpose was to investigate perceived tranquility (theoretically a combination of moderate fascination and aesthetic pleasure) and perceived danger in urban and natural settings. We explored the relationship of these two target variables to each other and to a set of three predictor variables: openness, setting care, and nature (amount of foliage and vegetation). Participants rated each of 48 color slides, evenly divided between urban and field/forest natural settings, for only one of the five variables. Several predictions derived from Attention Restoration Theory for tranquility and from a review of the environmental criminology literature for danger were supported: (1) tranquility was rated higher in natural than in urban settings, and the reverse was true for danger; (2) tranquility and danger were negatively correlated across all settings; (3) the three predictor variables were generally positively related to tranquility and negatively related to danger. Two variations from the general pattern of results emerged in model-testing analyses that controlled for setting category and the presence of other predictors. First, the negative relationship between setting care and perceived danger was stronger for urban than for natural settings, indicating that setting care is more salient for judgments of danger in urban settings. Second, openness was a significant predictor of danger (a negative relationship) but not of tranquility. These variations suggest that tranquility and danger probably should be viewed not as polar opposites but as distinct constructs.
This study evaluates three healing gardens surrounding a pediatric cancer center. All gardens contained seating, flowers and plants, but varied in size, features, and in user groups’ access to them. A post-occupancy evaluation (POE) yielded a dataset of 1400 garden-users for whom demographic information, activities, and length-of-stay were recorded. Results indicate differential usage patterns across gardens, user category (patient, visitor, or staff), and age (adults and children). The largest garden with most direct patient access was the most used. Staff mostly used the gardens to walk-through or to sit and eat, rarely interacting with features intended for active engagement. Despite patient and child-friendly designs, the overwhelming majority of visitors were adults who mostly engaged in sedentary activities. Children who did use the gardens interacted with garden features significantly more than adults. Although patient rooms are situated at ground-level around the gardens to promote window views of the gardens, the findings suggest an inverse relationship between patient window use and the number of people in the gardens. Finally, preliminary data suggest that emotional distress and pain are lower for all groups when in the gardens than when inside the hospital. Provisional design implications of these findings are discussed.
Children growing up in the inner city are at risk of academic underachievement, juvenile delinquency, teenage pregnancy, and other important negative outcomes. Avoiding these outcomes requires self-discipline. Self-discipline, in turn, may draw on directed attention, a limited resource that can be renewed through contact with nature. This study examined the relationship between near-home nature and three forms of self-discipline in 169 inner city girls and boys randomly assigned to 12 architecturally identical high-rise buildings with varying levels of nearby nature. Parent ratings of the naturalness of the view from home were used to predict children's performance on tests of concentration, impulse inhibition, and delay of gratification. Regressions indicated that, on average, the more natural a girl's view from home, the better her performance at each of these forms of self-discipline. For girls, view accounted for 20% of the variance in scores on the combined self-discipline index. For boys, who typically spend less time playing in and around their homes, view from home showed no relationship to performance on any measure. These findings suggest that, for girls, green space immediately outside the home can help them lead more effective, self-disciplined lives. For boys, perhaps more distant green spaces are equally important.
Different conceptual perspectives converge to predict that if individuals are stressed, an encounter with most unthreatening natural environments will have a stress reducing or restorative influence, whereas many urban environments will hamper recuperation. Hypotheses regarding emotional, attentional and physiological aspects of stress reducing influences of nature are derived from a psycho-evolutionary theory. To investigate these hypotheses, 120 subjects first viewed a stressful movie, and then were exposed to color/sound videotapes of one of six different natural and urban settings. Data concerning stress recovery during the environmental presentations were obtained from self-ratings of affective states and a battery of physiological measures: heart period, muscle tension, skin conductance and pulse transit time, a non-invasive measure that correlates with systolic blood pressure. Findings from the physiological and verbal measures converged to indicate that recovery was faster and more complete when subjects were exposed to natural rather than urban environments. The pattern of physiological findings raised the possibility that responses to nature had a salient parasympathetic nervous system component; however, there was no evidence of pronounced parasympathetic involvement in responses to the urban settings. There were directional differences in cardiac responses to the natural vs urban settings, suggesting that attention/intake was higher during the natural exposures. However, both the stressor film and the nature settings elicited high levels of involuntary or automatic attention, which contradicts the notion that restorative influences of nature stem from involuntary attention or fascination. Findings were consistent with the predictions of the psycho-evolutionary theory that restorative influences of nature involve a shift towards a more positively-toned emotional state, positive changes in physiological activity levels, and that these changes are accompanied by sustained attention/intake. Content differences in terms of natural vs human-made properties appeared decisive in accounting for the differences in recuperation and perceptual intake.
The purpose of this study was to develop and test a self-rating restoration scale (RS) designed to measure the restorative quality of environments. Both the Kaplan and Kaplan [The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective, Cambridge University Press, New York] and Ulrich [Aesthetic and affective response to natural environment, in: I. Altman, J.F. Wohlwill (Eds.), Behavior and Natural Environments, Plenum Press, New York] hypothesize that restorative environments are settings that facilitate the reduction of stress. Over the past decade, an increasing amount of empirical research has also shown that the restorative influences of environments manifest themselves in emotional, physiological, and cognitive responses of humans [J. Environ. Psychol. 11 (1991) 201]. Thus, the RS should cover, at least, these three dimensions. Moreover, the dimension of intended behavior in environments was also included. This RS was examined and revised through a two-phased experimental design. Forty-eight color slides selected from thousands of slides were used as the stimuli and the surrogates for the actual environments in the experiments. These 48 strictly controlled slides represented a proper and comprehensive sample of the six major terrestrial biomes of the world: desert, tundra, grassland, coniferous forest, deciduous forest, and tropical forest [Ecology and Our Endangered Life-Support Systems, Sinauer Associates Publishers, Sunderland], and varied as a function of high and low levels of three physical variables: complexity, openness, and water features. Five experiments with five groups of undergraduate students at Texas A&M University as subjects (total n=505) were conducted to test the RS. Results of exploratory, confirmatory, analysis of moment structures (AMOS), correlation, principal component, and reliability analyses indicated that internal validity, convergent and discriminant validity, convergent and divergent construct validity, and reliability of the RS were all adequate. Thus, the operational definition and the construct of restorativeness developed in this study can be applied to future research on recovery from stress. Hopefully, this theory-derived and data-oriented RS will be eventually applied to various environments by any concerned individuals to examine the result of planning and design practice in terms of a desired state of recovery from stress.
The population of the United States of America is currently experiencing increased illness from dispersed and synergistic causes. Many of the acute insults of the past have receded due to centralized health care and regulatory action. However, chronic ailments including asthma and allergies, animal-transmitted diseases, obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and depression are on the rise. These diverse illnesses join with forest fragmentation, stream degradation, wetlands destruction, and the concomitant loss of native species to suggest detrimental contributions from the built environment.
https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/148476/1/1992_Psych_benefits_of_nearby_nature_In_Relf.pdf
Most work on healing places has involved sites associated with the Western cultural tradition and expressed in focused locations. This paper examines a non-Western culture and a diffuse landscape of healing. Everything in Navajo culture could be called 'religious,' in that religious feeling cannot be separated from any aspect of a traditional Navajo life. Much of this religious feeling is embodied in the landscape itself. This article explores the ways in which the physical landscape, the spiritual landscape, the symbolic landscape, and the built environment-intertwine and interact to produce a sacred geography which functions as a healing landscape.
This study reports on the development and psychometric validation of a perceived restorative components scale for children (PRCS-C). Children (n=112 boys, n=113 girls) aged 8 to 11 years completed an initial pool of 23 items addressing the components of a restorative environment to assess two familiar, everyday environments- their school playground and their school library. Factor analysis indicated a five-factor model (Being Away– Physical, Being Away- Psychological, Fascination, Compatibility and Extent) of 15 items best fit the data, consistent with prior adult restorativeness measure research and fitting within Kaplan’s Attention Restoration Theory. Satisfactory internal consistency was found for four of the five factors, with a two-item construct of Extent being lowest. School playgrounds had significantly higher restoration potential than school libraries, when compared with school classrooms, indicating divergent validity of the measure. Results were examined by sex and age and differences reported as a broad indicator of the measure’s ability to differentiate between groups of people’s reports of perceived restorativeness and possible developmental differences.
The increase in stress and stress-related ill- health is escalating dramatically in the Western World. An alarmingly growing part of the bud- get for medical services in Sweden is being used for people suffering from different stress-rela- ted ill-health. In this paper, we present some results from a study in which 656 randomly selected people in nine Swedish cities answered a questionnaire addressing their experiences of stress and their use of green outdoor environments at their workplaces. The results may be interpreted as showing that access to a garden at work may have a positive impact both on stress and on "trivsel", a Swedish word meaning comfort, pleasure and well-being. Apart from actually being in a garden, a view of a garden may also decrease employees' level of stress and affect trivsel in a positive way. According to our results, laying out more and easily accessible gardens adjacent to workplaces could create environments that are more resto- rative and freer from demands and stress.
Research and teaching in environmental health have centered on the hazardous effects of various environmental exposures, such as toxic chemicals, radiation, and biological and physical agents. However, some kinds of environmental exposures may have positive health effects. According to E.O. Wilson’s “biophilia” hypothesis, humans are innately attracted to other living organisms. Later authors have expanded this concept to suggest that humans have an innate bond with nature more generally. This implies that certain kinds of contact with the natural world may benefit health. Evidence supporting this hypothesis is presented from four aspects of the natural world: animals, plants, landscapes, and wilderness. Finally, the implications of this hypothesis for a broader agenda for environmental health, encompassing not only toxic outcomes but also salutary ones, are discussed. This agenda implies research on a range of potentially healthful environmental exposures, collaboration among professionals in a range of disciplines from public health to landscape architecture to city planning, and interventions based on research outcomes.
The paper reports on a study that looks at the impact of a corrections environment upon prisoners through a process of monitoring inmate attendance at sick call clinic. Contrasting cell block designs and characteristics are compared on the basis of significant differential demands for health care services emanating from specific areas. Known psychological and physiological responses to situations perceived to be threatening provide the theory that health behavior may be used as one indirect measure of environmentally induced stress. Findings suggest there are architectural design features of the prison environment that provide basis of perceived threats to inmate safety and survival. Loss of privacy on several dimensions appears to be a critical environmental characteristic.
This article investigates the direct and indirect effects of windows in the workplace onjob satisfaction, intention to quit, and general well-being. The impact of three specific influencing mechanisms are examined: general level of illumination, sunlight penetration, and view. The extent to which these environmental features might moderate the negative consequences of job stress is investigated. The sample consisted of 100 white-and blue-collar workers who were employed in a large wine-producing organization in the Mediterranean region of Southern Europe. The results showed a significant direct effect for sunlight penetration on job satisfaction, intention to quit, and general well-being. A view of natural elements (i.e., trees, vegetation, plants, and foliage) was found to buffer the negative impact of job stress on intention to quit and to have a similar, albeit marginal, effect on general well-being. No effects for general level of illumination were found.
A new direction for medical geographic study is suggested, the analysis of places which have attained an enduring reputation for achieving physical, mental, and spiritual healing. The reasons for the efficacy of these therapeutic landscapes can be examined by using themes derived from the traditional landscape ideas of cultural geography, humanistic geography, structuralist geography, and the principles of holistic health. These themes are categorized as inner/meaning (including the natural setting, the built environment, sense of place, symbolic landscapes, and everyday activities) and outer/societal context (including beliefs and philosophies, social relations and/or inequalities, and territoriality). By using a methodology termed an 'archaeology of discourse' in which written and oral documents are examined, the themes are used to investigate the healing reputation of the Asclepian sanctuary at Epidauros, Greece. Study findings have policy implications for health-care practice today.
Abstract The ‘restorative environment’ concept sees considerable use in the ,environment-behaviour-design field these days. Much of the ,concept’s appeal has to do ,with how ,it helps us to ,relate health to experiences in natural environments. With this paper I offer some,support for efforts to develop,and apply knowledge,about restorative environments,as health,resources. I will also share some,thoughts onwhere,we stand,with research on restorative environments,and where research in the area can go next. More specifically, I will discuss how we define restoration; a general framework for theories about restorative environments; some,requirements of empirical tests of those theories; and the public health vs. therapeutic values of restorative environments. Keywords:Natural environments; restoration; restorative environments; stress
Withdrawal of land from agricultural production is creating possibilities for reafforestation in several areas of Europe. Reafforestation can serve recreational as well as ecological goals. The present study considers the effects of two ecologically significant forest design characteristics, accessibility and vegetation density, on mood, an outcome relevant to recreational planning. It simultaneously addresses the more general question of how changes in mood correspond to movement through an environment. The two forest design variables were manipulated both between and within subjects in a two (high accessibility vs interrupted accessibility) by two (dense vs half-open vegetation) by four (consecutive forest sections) design. The experimental manipulations combined sets of sequential photographic slides with verbal descriptions regarding aspects of accessibility (i.e. presence vs absence of a path, passableness, possibilities for orientation). Subjects (n=98) were randomly sampled residents of Leiden, recruited by telephone and screened for prior hiking experience. All provided seven affective appraisals for two preliminary recreational area sections and then the four experimental forest sections. The affective appraisals could be interpreted in terms of arousal and pleasure dimensions of mood. Arousal and pleasure scores were both affected by the accessibility manipulations in keeping with expectations while the manipulations of vegetation density were somewhat less influential.
The nearby natural environment plays a far more significant role in the well-being of children residing in poor urban environments than has previously been recognized. Using a premove/postmove longitudinal design, this research explores the linkage between the naturalness or restorativeness of the home environment and the cognitive functioning of 17 low-income urban children (aged 7–12 yrs). Both before and after relocation, objective measures of naturalness were used along with a standardized instrument (the Attention Deficit Disorders Evaluation Scale) measuring the children's cognitive functioning. Results show that children whose homes improved the most in terms of greenness following relocation also tended to have the highest levels of cognitive functioning following the move. The implications with respect to policy and design are also discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A considerable body of folklore and scientific research alludes to the efficacy of the vernacular environment to influence both aesthetic experience and general well-being. To examine explicitly whether stress recovery and/or immunization varies as a function of the roadside environment, 160 college-age participants, both male and female, viewed one of four different video-taped simulated drives through outdoor environments immediately following and preceding mildly stressful events. Overall, it was anticipated that participants who viewed artifact-dominated drives, relative to participants who viewed nature-dominated drives, would show greater autonomic activity indicative of stress (e.g. elevated blood pressure and electrodermal activity), as well as show altered somatic activity indicative of greater negative affect (e.g. elevated electromyographic (EMG) activity over the brow region and decreased activity over the cheek region). In addition, it was expected that participants who viewed nature-dominated drives would experience quicker recovery from stress and greater immunization to subsequent stress than participants who viewed artifact-dominated drives. The overall pattern of results is consistent with both hypotheses and the findings are interpreted to support postulating a sympathetic-specific mechanism that underlies the effect of nature on stress recovery and immunization.
Theory and research dealing with place identity and restorative environments have for the most part proceeded independently. Assuming that emotional- and self-regulation are processes underlying the development of place identity, and that a person's favorite place is an exemplar of environments used in such regulation processes, the present study goes beyond preliminary observations about restorative aspects of favorite places to consider how individuals evaluate their favorite places using terms set out in restorative environments theory. Finnish university students (n=78) evaluated the central square of their city (Tampere) and favorite and unpleasant places of their own designation using the Perceived Restorativeness Scale (PRS), an instrument based on attention restoration theory. Consistent with notions of self-regulation, PRS subscale scores for Being Away, Fascination, Coherence, and Compatibility were all high in the favorite place evaluations, but Coherence and Compatibility were reliably higher than Being Away, which was in turn reliably higher than Fascination. Also, PRS subscale scores for the favorite places were reliably higher than those for the central square, which were in turn higher than those for the unpleasant places. Furthermore, differences were also found in self-reported emotional states associated with each place. The discussion suggests ways to develop further mutually reinforcing relations between restorative environments research and research on place identity.
We compared psychophysiological stress recovery and directed attention restoration in natural and urban field settings using repeated measures of ambulatory blood pressure, emotion, and attention collected from 112 randomly assigned young adults. To vary restoration needs, we had half of the subjects begin the environmental treatment directly after driving to the field site. The other half completed attentionally demanding tasks just before the treatment. After the drive or the tasks, sitting in a room with tree views promoted more rapid decline in diastolic blood pressure than sitting in a viewless room. Subsequently walking in a nature reserve initially fostered blood pressure change that indicated greater stress reduction than afforded by walking in the urban surroundings. Performance on an attentional test improved slightly from the pretest to the midpoint of the walk in the nature reserve, while it declined in the urban setting. This opened a performance gap that persisted after the walk. Positive affect increased and anger decreased in the nature reserve by the end of the walk; the opposite pattern emerged in the urban environment. The task manipulation affected emotional self-reports. We discuss implications of the results for theories about restorative environments and environmental health promotion measures.
Urbanicity presents a challenge for the pursuit of sustainability. High settlement density may offer some environmental, economic, and social advantages, but it can impose psychological demands that people find excessive. These demands of urban life have stimulated a desire for contact with nature through suburban residence, leading to planning and transportation practices that have profound implications for the pursuit of sustainability. Some might dismiss people's desire for contact with nature as the result of an anti-urban bias in conjunction with a romantic view of nature. However, research in environmental psychology suggests that people's desire for contact with nature serves an important adaptive function, namely, psychological restoration. Based on this insight, we offer a perspective on an underlying practical challenge: designing communities that balance settlement density with satisfactory access to nature experience. We discuss research on four issues: how people tend to believe that nature is restorative; how restoration needs and beliefs shape environmental preferences; how well people actually achieve restoration in urban and natural environments; and how contact with nature can promote health. In closing, we consider urban nature as a design option that promotes urban sustainability.
We tested the hypothesis that exposure to nature stimuli restores depleted voluntary attention capacity and affects selective attention. Before viewing a video of either a natural or an urban environment, 28 subjects first completed a proofreading task to induce mental load and then performed Posner's attention-orienting task. After viewing the video they performed the attention-orienting task a second time. Cardiac inter-beat interval (IBI) was measured continuously to index autonomic arousal. Before the video both groups reacted faster to validly versus invalidly cued targets in the attention-orienting task. After the video, the urban group was still faster on validly versus invalidly cued trials, but in the nature group this difference disappeared. During the video the nature group had a longer mean IBI (lower heart rate) measured as the difference from baseline than the urban group. The results suggest that reduced autonomic arousal during the video engendered less spatially selective attention in the nature group compared to the urban group.
This study is based on a theoretical view which suggests that under increased demands for attention, individuals' capacity to direct attention may become fatigued. Once fatigued, attentional restoration must occur in order to return to an effectively functioning state. An attention-restoring experience can be as simple as looking at nature. The purpose of this study was to explore whether university dormitory residents with more natural views from their windows would score better than those with less natural views on tests of directed attention. Views from dormitory windows of 72 undergraduate students were categorized into four groups ranging from all natural to all built. The capacity to direct attention was measured using a battery of objective and subjective measures. Natural views were associated with better performance on attentional measures, providing support for the proposed theoretical view.
The Leichtag Family Healing Garden at Children's Hospital and Health Center, San Diego was planned and built as a healing environment space for patients, families, and staff. A Post-Occupancy Evaluation (POE) was conducted to determine whether the garden was meeting the goals of reducing stress, restoring hope and energy, and increasing consumer satisfaction. Results from behavioral observations, surveys, and interviews indicated a number of benefits of the garden. The garden was perceived as a place of restoration and healing, and use was accompanied by increased consumer satisfaction. However, the garden was not utilized as often or as effectively as intended. Children, parents and many staff members recommended changes for the garden, such as the inclusion of more trees and greenery, and more interactive ‘things for kids to do’. In addition, the majority of family members surveyed throughout the hospital did not know about the garden. Based on the findings, recommendations for changes were developed to promote better use of the garden. These research findings can be used to guide the future planning, design, building, and subsequent evaluation of garden environments in children's hospitals and pediatric settings.
Does the widely documented tendency to prefer natural over built environments owe to the perception of greater restorative potential in natural environments? In the present experimental study we tested the mediating role of restoration in environmental preferences. Participants viewed a frightening movie, and then were shown a video of either a natural or a built environment. We used two examples of each type of environment. Participants’ mood ratings were assessed before and after they viewed the frightening movie, and again after viewing the environmental video. Participants also rated the beauty of the environment shown (to indicate preference) and performed a test of concentration after viewing the environmental video. The results indicate that participants perceived the natural environments as more beautiful than the built environments. In addition, viewing natural environments elicited greater improvement in mood and marginally better concentration than viewing built environments. Mediational analyses revealed that affective restoration accounted for a substantial proportion of the preference for the natural over the built environments. Together, these results help substantiate the adaptive function of people's environmental preferences.
Two studies were conducted with the aim of developing a set of rating scale measures of restorative components of environments. In Study 1, 238 Norwegian undergraduates acting as subjects imagined themselves to be either in a nature environment or a city environment which they rated on unipolar scales intended to describe how they experienced the environments. In Study 2 another sample of 157 subjects recruited from the same population of Norwegian undergraduates viewed videos of a forest, park, sea area, city, and a snowy mountain, imagining themselves to be in these environments while performing ratings on the same scales. In both studies factor analyses yielded results in agreement with a theory proposed by Kaplan and Kaplan (1989). However, the being away factor posited by the theory was split into two factors, one with high loadings on rating scales tapping being physically away, the other with high loadings on rating scales tapping being psychologically away. The remaining three factors were defined by rating scales tapping extent, fascination, and compatibility, respectively. Composite measures of the factors had acceptable reliability. Furthermore, as predicted, environments with nature elements generally scored higher than city environments on all measures. Compatibility and fascination predicted preference ratings of the environments, whereas escape and compatibility predicted selfratings of relaxation.
This paper examines the factors which have contributed to Lourdes' attraction for millions as a place of healing: the religious pilgrimage tradition; Lourdes' central role in political, economic, social, and cultural changes in France; belief in miraculous cures reported at Lourdes; and the pilgrim experience. Themes emphasized throughout the paper are physical, mental, and spiritual transformation; historical contingency; the role of faith; place meaning; and a contested reality. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd