ArticlePDF Available

Abstract and Figures

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.
Content may be subject to copyright.
Ulrich,
R.
S.
(1979).
Visual
landscapes and psychological well-
being.
Landscape Research
4
(1
):
1 7-23.
Visual Landscapes and Psychological Well-Being
Roger
S.
Ulrich
Department of Geography University of Delaware
Introduction
The notion that exposure to nature is psychologically
healthful is very old, and has appeared in many cultures.
A more specific form of this hypothesis, advanced by
numerous writers through history, is the idea that
contact with plants, water, and other nature elements
can calm anxiety and help people cope with life's
stresses.
As
an example, the renowned American
landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted strongly
believed that urban dwellers find nature relaxing, and
wrote that nature reproduced in urban settings brings
'tranquility and rest to the mind' (1870, p. 23). Today
this idea is frequently heard in subjective arguments
favouring, for example, city parks and the provision of
urban fringe wilderness areas. Given the persistence and
importance of the 'nature tranquility hypothesis',
it
is
surprising that this notion has remained virtually
untested by researchers.
The research described here is intended as a step towards
the evaluation of this hypothesis for the specific case of
visual contact with outdoor environments. Two principal
questions are addressed:
1
)
what effects, if any, does
visual perception of nature have on feelings of anxiety;
and 2) how do these effects compare with those
produced by views of urban environments lacking nature
elements? Environmental perception is of course multi-
sensory, and is not restricted to vision. If some types (as
opposed to levels) of environmental content or stimuli
do effect anxiety
it
is possible that senses such as hearing
or smell are also of importance. Nonetheless
it
is not
artificial to focus on visual aspects of landscapes. Vision
is by far our most important sense in terms of yielding
information about outdoor environments. Moreover,
features of life in modern societies
-
such as heavy
relipce on the automobile
-
have further heightened
the Importance of vision relative to other senses. The
individual. for example, who sits in an air-conditioned or
heated room and gazes outdoors through a double-paned
window, experiences the outside world almost entirely
in visual terms. In this example,
it
would be of interest
to planners as well as behavioral scientists to know
whether the type of landscape visible through the
window influences the individual's psychological well-
being.
Methods
The basic design of the experiment involved showing
coloured slides of outdoor environments to two groups
of mildly stressed subjects. One group was shown 50
slides of unspectacular nature scenes dominated by green
vegetation. The other group viewed 50 urban scenes
lacking nature elements. The 'affect states' or feelings
of the subjects, defined primarily in terms of anxiety
emotions, were measured both immediately before and
after the slide exposures. Comparisons of the results for
the
two
different times' make possible inferences
concerning the anxiety reducing effects of the nature
and urban scenes. The principal hypothesis prior to the
data collection was that the anxiety levels of both
groups would decline during the slide viewings, but that
the group shown nature scenes would report
significantly lower post-slide levels than the group
exposed to urban views. More detailed discussions follow
concerning the procedures for selecting the slides, and
the methods of the experiment.
Selection of Slides
Given the major role of slides in the experiment,
it
should be pointed out that more than a score of studies
have supported the use of slides and photographs as
surrogates for 'real' environmental views (e.g. Shafer
and Richards, 1974; Zube, Pitt, and Anderson, 1974;
Sorte, 1975; Clamp, 1976.) Also, theories of psycho-
physiological arousal assign major importance to visual
properties of environments as factors affecting
psychological activation (e.g. Berlyne, 1971; Kuller, in
press). The notion that visual properties such as stimulus
complexity and colour affect a person's level of
'activation or arousal is generally accepted.
It
is a
reasonable assumption that such properties are
accurately simulated by colour slides. Most importantly,
the fact that responses and feelings related to visual
properties of environments are of salient concern
supports the validity of using slides as a simulation
technique.
The collections of nature and urban scenes were selected
from a larger group of more than 300 slides taken in
Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. The slides were
taken in September, which meant that green vegetation
was the dominant content in the nature views. Insofar as
possible, the slides were taken under similar lighting and
sun-angle conditions. All slides were taken from the
ground; an attempt was made to avoid composing the
views. No people or animals were visible in either the
nature or urban collections. The absence of people
probably increasedthe pleasantness levels of the urban
as well as nature scenes (McClelland and Auslander,
1 976; Carls, 1974; Sorte, 1978).
Although the nature sample excluded built features,
many of the views in this collection were obviously man-
influenced. For example, several scenes in the final
sample of 50 slides showed parts of cultivated fields. The
urban scenes primarily depicted commercial landscapes,
and to a lesser extent industrial areas. The urban slides
excluded residential areas, churches, funeral agencies,
police stations, fire stations, and hospitals, because of
the possibility that emotional associations would bias
the results. The urban collection also excluded scenes
containing litter, graffiti, and other blight.
The final samples of
50
nature and
50
urban views were
selected to represent diversity in terms of elements such
as vegetation and building types. Also, each sample
presented a range of values for depth and complexity
(Ulrich, 1974, 1977). Complexity was an important
consideration in selecting the samples because the
complexity level of a visual display is known to affect
the perceiver's state of psycho-physiological arousal or
activation (Berlyne and McDonnell, 1965; Baker and
Franken, 1967). If slide samples had been chosen that
varied markedly in terms of complexity, this difference
alone could have produced significant variation in the
anxiety levels of the groups of subjects
-
thereby
obscuring findings concerning the influences of the
nature and urban content. With this point in mind, a
panel of judges procedure (Craik, 1970; Kaplan, 1972)
was utilized to obtain complexity ratings for each slide.'
On the basis of the judges' scores, the final samples were
chosen so that the overall complexity levels of the
nature and urban collections were similar (Table 1
).
In
practice, the balancing of the samples was achieved by
selecting urban slides with complexity values in the
lower ranges. and choosing nature scenes having scores
in the higher ranges.
These selection procedures meant that the sample of
nature slides
-
compared to most nature landscapes in
the northeastern United States
-
was unrepresentatively
high in complexity. The high complexity of the slides
was in many instances produced by rough textures and
coarse vegetation, and consequently many of the nature
scenes appeared 'scruffy' and comparatively unaesthetic.
(Figure 1). By contrast the urban sample
--
compared to
most American urban landscapes
-
was unrepresenta-
tively low in complexity, and included a dispropor-
tionate number of 'clean', neat urban views. Indeed, a
conscious attempt was made to include a large number
of attractive scenes in the urban sample. (Figure 2).
These characteristics of the samples meant that the
experiment was a conservative test of the psychological
effects of nature versus urban scenes.
Table
1
:
Complexity Levels of Urban and Nature Scenes
General Nature Scenes Urban Scenes
Complexity Level (n
=
50) (n
=
50)
Low
Mid-Range
High
Figure
1:
Examples of Landscape Scenes-Nature Dominated by Vegetation
Figure
2:
Examples of Landscape Scenes-Urban
Methods of Experiment
The subjects were
46
students in an introductory
geography course at the University of Delaware. The
students' fields of concentration were diverse, ranging
from the humanities to natural sciences. The subjects
had taken a one-hour course examination prior to the
experiment, and were therefore experiencing some
anxiety and elevation of arousal. Immediately upon
completing the exam the subjects were divided into two
groups and seated in identical windowless rooms.
As
the first step in the data collection, both groups were
asked to answer
12
questions of the Zuckerman
lnven tory of Personal Reactions (ZIPERS) Zuckerman,
1977). The ZIPERS is a broad affect test that measures
an individual's emotions and anxiety state at the
particular time the test
is
taken. The ZIPERS assesses
feelings on five factors: fear arousal, positive affect,
angerlaggression, attentiveness-coping, and sadness. The
respondent indicates on a
5
point scale the degree to
which each itern describes the way he feels 'now'.
Examplas of the items are:
'
I feel sad', and 'I feel
affectionate or warrr~hearted'.
Following the ZIPERS test, both groups witnessed slide
presentations that were procedurally identical. The
subjects were instructed to 'pay attention to the slides',
and were requested to rate the scenes relative to one
another on a 5-point aesthetic preference scale The
purpose of obtaining preference ratings was simply o
assure that the subjects paid attention to the slides.
1
Before commencing the ratings, the subjects were briefly
shown the first
20
slides from the collection in order to
reveal the range of content in the sample, and thereby
assist the individuals in making relative preference
judgements. Each group was then shown its sample of
50
nature or urban slides at intervals of
18
seconds. (An
18-
second exposure time was chosen after trial runs of the
experiment. This interval proved of sufficient length to
permit unhurried perception of a scene, but at the same
time was not excessively long so as to allow the subject's
attention to wander). The entire slide procedure took
approxirriately
18
minutes. Upon cornpletion of the slide
presentation, the groups answered the ZIPERS items for
a second time. Lastly, the subjects were asked to provide
background information that included sex and the
general type of environment lived in before coming to
the University (rural area, small town, suburb, or city)
The data collections for both groups were synchronised
time-wise as they proceeded through the various stages
of the experiment. Thus, the single difference in the
groups' experiences stemmed from the variation in
content between the two collections of slides. This
meant that if the groups' anxiety levels changed in
different ways during the slide viewings, the variation
could be attributed to the nature versus urban content
difference of the slides.
Results
Pre-Slide Affect Scores
A series of nonparametric Mann-Whitney U tests-
identified no statistically significant differences between
the groups' scores for the ZIPERS items prior to the
slides. These results indicate that affect levels, or feelings
and moods, were similar across groups prior to the slide
presentations. The mean values for the pre-slide ZIPERS
scores (Table 2) suggest that anxiety levels had indeed
been somewhat elevated by the examination prior to the
experiment. Compared to ZIPERS ratings obtained
during normal class sessions,the subjects' scores at the
beginning of the experiment indicated higher levels of
Fear Arousal and AngerlAgression, and lower levels of
Positive Affect. Levels of Sadness and Attentiveness
were similar to scores on normal class days.
Results: Effects of Urban Versus Nature Scenes
As
the first step in analysing the effects of the slide
exposures, each group's post-slide Z IPE RS scores were
compared with its scores at the beginning of the
experiment. A nonparametric test, Wilcoxon signed
ranks analysis (Siegel, 1956). was used in these within-
group comparisons to identify significant differences.
Unexpectedly, the results suggest that the group shown
urban scenes felt somewhat worse after the siide viewing
(Table 2). Although the urban group's post-slide scores
indicate some improvement (not significant) on the Fear
Arousal factor, the results reveal a pattern for the
subjects' emotional states to deteriorate in terms of the
other dimensions. While most of the differences between
the pre and post-slide scores are not significant, there is a
clear trend in the changes towards lower levels of
psychological well-being.
Of particular note is the significant increase in Sadness
(p<.025). Thus, exposure to the urban views appears to
have more aggravated than mitigated the subjects'
Table
2:
Affect Scores Before and After Slide Presentations
Affect Factor
Fear Arousal
Anger and Aggression
Sadness
Positive ~ffect
Attentiveness
ZIPERS Items
Feel fearful
Heart is beating faster
Breathing faster
Feel angry or defiant
Feel like getting outof this
situation or avoiding
it
Feel like hurting or 'telling off'
someone
Feel sad
Feel carefree or playful
Feel affectionate or warmhearted
Feel elated or pleased
Feel like acting friendly or
affectionately
Feel attentive or concentrating
psychological states. The sharp decline in Attentiveness
(p<.01) can be interpreted as an indication that the
urban views were not effective in maintaining the
subjects' attention and interest.
In sharp contrast are the results for the nature scenes
(Table 2). The post-slide scores reflect a consistent
pattern of improvement in well-being, and the changes
for two factors are statistically significant. All four
individual items in the Positive Affect dimension show
marked increases, and the change
in
terms of the factor
as a whole is highly significant (p<.005), indicating that
the subjects had higher levels of positive feelings after
viewing the nature scenes. Likewise, the change in the
Fear Arousal factor is highly significant (p<.005), with
the declines in item scores indicating lower levels of
fearfulness and arousal or activation. In contrast to the
results for the urban group, the post-slide decline in
Attentiveness is not significant. Whereas the changes in
the Sadness and AngerIAgression factors are not
significant,
it
should be noted that the direction of
change for every item is toward improvement of well-
being. Overall the results strongly suggest that exposure
to the nature scenes had mitigating influences on the
subjects' anxiety states.
A direct comparison of the effects of the nature and
urban scenes is made in Table
3.
The table lists the
magnitude and direction of change between pre and
post-slide Z IPERS scores.for both groups of subjects.
The 'change' figure for each item was calculated by
subtracting the mean pre-slide score from the post-slide
value. The 'difference between groups' for each item was
computed by subtracting the change of one group from
the change of the other. The 'difference between groups'
figure therefore represents the total change in a given
ZIPERS item directly,attributable to the effects of the
nature and urban scenes. A series of Mann-Whitney U
tests we're performed to determine if the differences
were statistically significant.
The results in Table
3
clearly support the conclusion
that the nature and urban slides had different effects on
the subjects' emotional states. The most salient
difference is in terms of the Positive Affect factor; a
Mann-Whitney test of the variation attributable to slide
content was highly significant (p=,002), indicating that
the effects of the nature and urban scenes on levels of
positive feelings were very different. Inspection of the
Urban Group Nature Group
Before After Before After
Slides Slides Slides SI ides
1.83 1.52 1.57 1.30 (p<.005
2.09 1.74 1.98
1.22
for factor)
1.83 1.57 1.45 1.17
1.78 1.65 1.87 2.35 (p<.005
1.96 2.00 1.94 2.65 for factor)
2.09 1.87 1.87 2.44
Table
3:
Comparison of Effects of Nature and Urban Slides on Affect States
Affect Factor
Fear Arousal
Anger and Aggression
Sadness
Positive Affect
Attentiveness
ZIPERS Items
Feel fearful
Heart is beating faster
Breathing faster
Feel angry or defiant
Feel like getting out of this
situation or avoiding
it
Feel like hurting or 'telling off'
someone
Feel sad
Feel carefree or playful
Feel affectionate or warmhearted
Feel elated or pleased
Feel like acting friendly or
affectionately
Feel attentive or concentrating
data in Table
3
reveals that the variation in Positive
Affect arose primarily because exposure to the nature
scenes produced higher levels of positive feelings such as
friendliness and playfulness. A smaller component of
the variation was the tendency of the urban scenes to
reduce such feelings.
There was also a significant difference between the
urban and nature scenes in terms of effects on Sadness
(p=I)l). This variation arose primarily from the increase
in feelings of sadness produced by the urban scenes, and
not from the weak therapeutic influence of the nature
scenes. The results for the AngerlAggression factor
suggest mild improvement in well-being associated with
the nature exposures, and a tendency for the urban
scenes to aggravate feelings on this dimension. The
variation in terms of AngerlAggression is most marked
for the single item: 'I feel like hurting or telling off
someone' (p=.04). However, when the groups were
scaled on the basis of their changes for the entire factor,
the difference reached only p=.11. The results therefore
do not permit firm conclusions regarding differential
effects of the nature and urban scenes on feelings of
anger and aggression.
The variations between groups for the Fear Arousal and
Attentiveness factors are not significant. However,
it
will
be recalled that the within group decline in Fear Arousal
was significant for the individuals shown nature scenes,
but not for the group shown urban scenes. Also, there
was a significant decline in Attentiveness associated with
the urban slides, but not with the nature slides. This
implies that the nature scenes were somewhat more
effective than the urban scenes both in maintaining
attention and reducing fear arousal:.
Background Variables and Affect Scores
The final phase of the analysis tested whether the
subjects' affect states and affect changes differed as a
function of 1) sex or 2) the type of environment in
which they had grown up. The group shown nature
scenes included 10 males and 13 females; the group
shown urban scenes was comprised of 1 1 males and 12
females. A series of Mann-Whitney
U
tests revealed no
significant sex differences. These results are consistent
with a study by Zuckerman (1977), who found little
variation between sexes in state anxiety for a wide range
Change in
Urban Group
(from pre to
post-sl ide states)
-.31
-.35
-.26
+.I3
+.26
+.09
+.47
-.I3
+.04
Change in
Nature Group
(From pre to Difference
post-slide states) Between Groups
-27
.04
-.76 .41
-.28 .02
-.I8 .31 (p=.ll
for factor)
-.05
.31
-26 .35
-.
13 .60 (p=.Ol)
+.48 .61
+.71 .67
-.22 +.57 .79 (p=.002)
for factor)
-.26
+.56
.82
of stress situations.
The subjects were also stratified on the bases of whether
they had grown up in a rural area (n=8), small town
(n=8), suburb (n=26), or city (n=4). Tests revealed no
significant differences in affect states or affect changes
as a function of these background environments. Similar
results were obtained when the subjects were stratified
into two larger groups (rural area and small town versus
suburb and city). Thus, the earlier findings concerning
differential effects of the nature and urban scenes apply
to both sexes in the study, and to subjects who had
grown up in different environments.
Summary
and
Discussion
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 AngerlAggression, 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.
The urban and nature scenes produced different changes
in psychological states despite the fact that the
complexity levels of the slide samples were similar.
Largely on the basis of laboratory studies by
psychologists using 'non-landscape' stimuli, complexity
has received considerable emphasis as a variable
influencing emotional activation. The findings hers
suggest the possibility that other visual properties
-
related to nature versus man-made differences
-
are also
of importance. It should also be pointed out that the
sample of urban scenes, compared to most American
urban landscapes, contained a disproportionately large
number of nonblighted, relatively aesthetic views. For
example, the urban collection included only one slide of
a roadside strip development; 'strips' are one of the most
common, as well as visually blighted, features in
American urban areas. The nature sample, on the other
hand, contained an unrepresentatively large number of
high complexity scenes that were 'scruffy' and relatively
unaesthetic in appearance. This meant that the
experiment was a conservative test of the effects of
nature versus urban scenes. If the slide collections had
been selected using a geographical sampling technique
rather than a procedure that favoured the urban scenes,
it
is likely that the differences among the effects of the
nature and urban scenes would have been even more
extreme.
The findings have a number of implications for
environmental planning and design. At the most general
level, the results suggest that outdoor visual
environments can influence individuals' psychological
well-being, and therefore should be given explicit
attention in planning and design decisions. Most planners
have some sensitivity for aesthetic aspects of
environments, and in fact there exists some direct
empirical evidence showing that aesthetic benefits can be
of considerable importance (e.g. Ulrich, 1974; Shafer
and Mietz, 1969). The findings here imply that the
importance of visual landscapes is by no means limited.
to aesthetics, but also includes a range of influences on
emotional states. More specifically, an individual's
experiences in terms of his degree of visual contact
with nature or urban scenes may influence his feelings,
and in some instances have distinctly positive or negative
effects on his well-being. Although the findings clearly
favour nature scenes vis-a-vis American urban views, the
results should not be construed as an indictment on
psychological grounds of urban landscapes in general. It
is likely that the differences between the effects of the
two landscape categories would have been less if the
urban scenes had contained large amounts of nature
elements, and perhaps if the forms and materials of the
built structures were different. For planners, the results
support the notion that the benefits of providing
landscaping or nature-like views in urban areas extend
beyond aesthetics to include such psychological
'payoffs' as higher levels of positive affect. A related
implication is that location and design decisions for
some activities and institutions
-
such as high stress
workplaces and hospitals
-
should assign considerable
importance to providing 'through the window' contact
with nature. Does a pre-operative hospital patient
experience less anxiety if his window overlooks a park
rather than, say, a motorway or vegetationless parking
lot? Do school children feel more anxious in windowless
classrooms than in classrooms having window views of
nature? Does an individual recuperate more quickly at
home after a stressful workday if, for example, his
apartment complex has been planned to allow visual
contact with a forest or lake? The potential of visual
landscapes to reduce or heighten anxiety, and to
influence other aspects of emotional states, should be
considered in attempts to achieve more holistic
evaluations of planning effects. In
t.his regard there will
likely emerge a demand for landscape researchers to
develop procedures for assessing the psychological, as
well as aesthetic, 'resources' of visual landscapes.
This study has been intended as an exploratory first
step, and many research questions remain. To what
extent do the results apply to people of different ages,
levels of education, culture, etc? Do the differences
which characterise psychological response to nature and
urban views vary seasonally? How do people respond to
scenes containing water? Are nature views more
therapeutic than urban scenes for individuals
experiencing boredom and understimulation rather than
anxiety and high arousal? Is a scene's aesthetic value
related to its influence on emotional well-being? What
man-made forms, textures, and materials evoke
responses similar to those to nature elements? These and
other unresolved questions underline the fact that the
general issue of differential human response to nature
and built elements is of central importance to landscape
research and planning.
Notes
1 The panel of judges consisted of two geographers, a
psychologist, a landscape architect, and a layman. The
judges worked independently, and rated each nature and
urban scene on a five-point complexity scale.
Complexity was judged in a phenomenal, subjective.
sense; this criterion insured that the measure had
psychological relevance.
2 The fact that the subjects rated the slides for
preference relative to one another, rather than on an
absolute scale, reduced the possibility that the rating
procedure might influence the groups' emotional states
in different ways. The mean rating on the 5-point scale
for the nature scenes was 2.96, and for the urban scenes,
2.72. The difference between the means is not
significant. This'suggests that if the rating procedures per
se had any effects on the subjects' feelings, the influences
on the two groups were similar.
References
Baker, G. and R. Franken. 1967 'Effects of Stimulus
Size, Brightness, and Complexity Upon EEG
Desy nchronisation'.
Psychonomic Science.
Vol. 7, No. 9,
pp. 289-290.
Berly ne, D. 197 1
Aesthetics and Psychobiology.
New
York: Appleton-Century Crofts.
Berlyne, D. and P. McDonnell. 1965 'Effects of Simulus
Complexity and Incongruity on Duration of EEG
Desy nchronisat ion'.
Electroencephalography and Clinical
Neurophysiology.
Vol. 1 8, pp. 1 56-1 61
.
Carls, E.G. 1974 'The Effects of People and
Man-Induced Conditions on Preferences for Outdoor
Recreation Landscapes'.
Journal of Leisure Research.
Vol. 6, NO. 2, pp. 1 13-1 24.
Clamp, P. 1976 'Evaluating English Landscapes
-
Some
Recent Developments'.
Environment and Planning.
Vol. 8, pp. 79-92.
Cra i k
,
K. H. 1 970
A System of Landscape Dimensions:
Appraisal of Its Objectivity and Illustration of Its
Scientific Application.
Report to Resources of the
Future, Inc. Berkeley: University of California Institute
of Personality Assessment and Research.
Kaplan, R. 1972 'The Dimensions of the Visual
Environment: Methodological Considerations' in W.
J.
Mitchell (Ed.):
Environmental Design: Research and
Practice.
Proceedings of the Environmental Design
Research Association Conference Three. Los Angeles.
Kuller, R. (in press) 'The Use of Space
-
Some
Physiological and Philosophical Aspects'. Proceedings of
the 3rd International Architectural Psychology
Conference. Strasbourg, France.
McClelland,
L.
and N. Auslander. 1976 'Determinants of
Perceived Crowding and Pleasantness in Public Settings'.
In Suedfeld, P. and Russell,
J.
A. (Eds.):
The Behavioral
Basis of Design.
Stroudsburg, Pa.: Dowden, Hutchinson,
and Ross.
Ol msted, F.
L.
1 870
Public Parks and the Enlargement
of Tows.
Cambridge: Riverside Press.
Shafer, E.
L.
and
J.
Mietz. 1969 'Aesthetic and
Emotional Experiences Rate High with Northeast
Wilderness Hikers'.
Environment and Behaviour.
Vol. 1
,
NO. 2, pp. 187-1 97.
Shafer, E. L. and T. A. Richards. 1974 'A Comparison
of Viewer Reactions to Outdoor Scenes and Photographs
of Those Scenes'. USDA Forest Service
Research Paper
Ne-302.
Upper Darby, Pa.: Northeastern Forest
Experiment Station.
Siegel, S. 1956
Non-Parametric Statistics for the
Behavioral Sciences.
Toronto: McGraw-Hi l
I.
Sorte, G.
J.
1975 'Methods for Presenting Planned
Environment'.
Man-Environment Systems.
Vol. 5, No.
3,
pp. 148-1
54.
Sorte, G.
J.
1978 Personal communication concerning
unpublished research. Lund Institute of Technology.
Sweden.
Ulrich
,
R
.
S. 1 974
Scenery and the Shopping Trip: The
Roadside Environment as a Factor in Route Choice.
Michigan Geographical Publications. No. 12. Ann Arbor:
Dept. of Geography, University of Michigan.
Ulrich, R. S. 1977 'Visual Landscape Preference: A
Model and Application',
Man-Environment Systems.
Vol. 7, No.
5,
pp. 279-293.
Zube, E., D. G. Pitt, and T. W. Anderson. 1974
'Environmental Simulation, Landscape Values, and
Resources'.
Man-Environment Systems.
Vol
.
4, No. 4,
pp. 245-246.
Zuckerman, M. 1977 'The Development of a Situation
Specific Trait-State Test for the Prediction and
Measurement of Affective Responses
Journal of
Consulting and Cliniwl Psychology.
Vol
.
45, No 4,
pp. 51 3-523.
1
Part of this research was presented as a paper at the annual
meeting of the Environmental Design Research Association.
Tucson. Arizona, April
1978.
... Nature experiences can bring positive effects on health outcomes, such as enhancing sleep quality (Grigsby-Toussaint et al., 2015), pain control (Lechtzin et al., 2010), and immune system functioning (Li et al., 2008), while alleviating stress (Ulrich et al., 1991), anxiety (Bratman et al., 2015), aggression (Bogar & Beyer, 2016), depression (Gascon et al., 2015), and loneliness (Maas et al., 2009), with many of these benefits stemming from the relaxation facilitated by nature experiences (Bratman et al., 2015;Lechtzin et al., 2010;Li et al., 2008;Ulrich et al., 1991). By relaxation, we refer to a multidimensional construct including restoration (recharged energy) and tension reduction (Thayer, 2001). To explain how nature experiences bring diverse benefits, various theoretical frameworks have been proposed including biophilia theory (BT) (Wilson, 1984), prospect-refuge theory (PRT) (Appleton, 1975), Savannah hypothesis (SH) (Orians & Heerwagen, 1992), stress reduction theory (SRT) (Ulrich, 1983;Ulrich et al., 1991), perceptual fluency account (PFA) (Joye & van den Berg, 2011), and attention restoration theory (ART) (R. Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989; S. Kaplan, 1995). ...
... Combining energy and tension dimensions, Thayer (2001) distinguished four types of mood states: Calm energy (high energy-low tension), Calm tiredness (low energy-low tension), Tense energy (high energy-high tension), and Tense tiredness (low energy-high tension); and argued that calm energy is optimal as in this mood, people experience a balance of energetic and calm (absence of tension) without experiencing tiredness and negative emotions such as anxiety or fear. The state of calm energy is widely promoted in the healthcare context and often referred to as being restored, which indicates a state of recovery from high or low physiological and psychological arousal through energy recharge and positive change (Ulrich, 1981(Ulrich, , 1984. ...
... Following Thayer's (2001) concept, which also includes energy recharge, in this study, we focus on the aspects of relaxation as the state of being balanced in both physical and psychological dimensions. Hence, relaxation in this study refers to the state in which one feels sufficiently recharged while being free from tension whereas negative moods surface when one is low on energy or under high stress and tension (Thayer, 2001;Xue et al., 2020). ...
Article
Full-text available
Nature experiences, especially the visual aspects of nature, have been widely used to facilitate relaxation. Fueled by digital technology, simulated visual nature experiences have gained popularity in creating healing environments that induce relaxation. However, while easily applicable, not all nature-imitating visuals lead to relaxation. How to effectively design relaxing visual nature experiences remains largely unexplored. This paper investigates how different nature qualities facilitate relaxing visual experiences and the roles of two personal characteristics (mood and nature-relatedness) play. Through an online survey and interviews, we assessed 16 nature video clips, representing eight distinctive nature qualities, and compared perceived experiences while considering the influence of personal characteristics. The results indicate four types of visual qualities (engaging, instinctive, ambient, and derivative) underlying nature-induced relaxation, and show that nature relatedness influences the degree to which nature video clips elicit relaxation. We discuss design implications for creating personalized digital nature.
... proporcionan bienestar psicológico a los habitantes (Ulrich, 1979), aumentan el valor de las propiedades (Anderson y Cordell, 1988) y generan una mayor derrama económica y flujo de capital en zonas comerciales con arbolado sano (Wolf, 2005), por lo tanto, el valor de las zonas verdes urbanas deberá ser tasado en función a los beneficios sociales que genera y no con base en el costo de manejo y mantenimiento. ...
Chapter
Full-text available
El entorno urbano conforma un complejo sistema para el desarrollo de las comunidades vegetales con características específicas que causan constante estrés en las plantas e influyen en su crecimiento, salud y longevidad. Estas características conforman complejos mosaicos que se modifican constantemente en el tiempo. La correcta interpretación del estado de conservación de las comunidades vegetales contribuye a la construcción de políticas públicas, al desarrollo urbano sustentable y la mejora sistemática del paisaje. Por ello, se evaluaron características dasométricas de árboles de alineamiento en el Centro de la Ciudad de Toluca, México. Se adaptaron los Índices de Valor de Importancia (IVI) y el Índice de Idoneidad Relavita (RPI) usados como herramientas de análisis de la información colectada. Los resultados muestran 2 425 árboles (>2.5 cm de Diámetro a la Altura de Pecho -1.3 m sobre suelo-), distribuidos en 36 especies y 25 géneros, de los cuales Fraxinus udhei (Wenz.) Lingelsh, Ligustrum lucidum W.T. Aiton y Liquidambar styraciflua L. fueron los más importantes ecológicamente. La estructura horizontal acumulada por categoría diamétrica muestra una curva bimodial asimétrica, mientras que la estructura vertical muestra tres estratos: el primero dominado por Cupressus lusitanica Mill. El segundo dominado por Populus deltoides Bartram ex Marshall y Fraxinus udhei; y en el estrato más bajo se concentra el resto de las especies, dando como resultado un dosel arbóreo por debajo de las edificaciones urbanas. La distribución espacial muestra que en el núcleo del centro urbano dominan especies de alto valor paisajístico: L. styraciflua. La estructura del bosque urbano, así como su distribución espacial está determinada por uso de ciertas especies en momentos determinados por la Administración Municipal, el valor paisajístico que otorgan los habitantes al arbolado, y a la estructura urbana. Se recomienda el establecimiento de A. negundo y E. americana cuando las condiciones del espacio lo permitan.
... This shows that, in parks with a good soundscape environment, especially in the sound scene after snow, the soundscape is more closely related to being away in terms of the features of restorativeness. This shows that the soundscape can help people to psychologically escape from unpleasant or irrelevant stimuli in their daily lives, such as an urban noise problem [77]. Thus, it can relieve mental fatigue and restore consumed attention [78]. ...
Article
Full-text available
Creating attractive urban green spaces in severely cold and harsh climates is significant for promoting peoples’ health and perceived restoration. However, there is little evidence regarding the urban green spaces in wintery and cold climates and its restorative benefits. This study utilized a pixel grid approach to quantify winter landscape characteristics and a self-reporting method to assess the restorative benefits of audiovisual interactions. The results show the following: (1) Different types of roads in urban parks have significant differences in their level of restorativeness, and the restorativeness benefits of the primary path in winter parks are the strongest. (2) The presence of snowy elements in winter landscapes can enhance park users’ potential to experience restorative characteristics in relation to “being away”. Moreover, there exists a noteworthy positive correlation between deciduous trees and their restoration benefits. (3) People’s perceptions of the tranquility of the soundscape and the duration of environmental exposure are critical mediators in the impact of the restorative path effect. (4) Compared with women, men have a higher restorative level in both the landscape and soundscape. This elucidates the restorative role of white space landscapes and soundscapes in public psychological perception when proposing appropriate forest-based healthcare strategies. It also provides theoretical guidance and optimization schemes for the overall planning, health planning, and design of white spaces shaped by cold urban green spaces.
... Warm and bright colors can provide sensory stimulation. Moreover, plant colors have positive effects on visual quality (Polat and Akay, 2015;Liu et al., 2023) and psychological well-being (Ulrich, 1979). This can explain why older adults prefer vivid plant colors with high color saturation. ...
Article
Landscape elements and features Older adults Preference heterogeneity Urban blue-green spaces A B S T R A C T Both global warming and population aging are key issues currently facing society. Urban blue-green space (UBGS) can effectively improve older adults' health by providing cooling and opportunities to experience nature, both of which are important factors affecting their health. A better understanding of the landscape preferences of older adults and the importance they assign to different landscape elements is key for the appropriate planning and design of climate-proof UBGS. Such UBGS may increase the visiting frequency and outdoor activities of older adults. Therefore, it is important to understand the climate-proof design of UBGS from an older adults' perspectives. However, the existing literature is insufficient, and only few studies have addressed climate-proof landscapes for older adults. To fill this gap, this study analyzed older adults' perceptions and preferences for climate-proof landscapes provided by UBGS in the city of Chengdu, China, using face-to-face questionnaires (n = 332) and interviews. The participants were asked to share their preferences for climate-proof facilities among photos of 13 landscape elements and 44 landscape features and indicate the importance of each one. The data were subsequently imported into SPSS22 and analyzed using chi-square tests, the analytic hierarchy process, and correlational analyses. The results showed that older adults attach almost equal importance to landscape features related to comfort and safety, while large differences were observed in their preferences for landscape elements related to aesthetics and sensory stimulation. These results can guide the scientific improvement of climate-proof landscape planning and design and provide new ideas for actively responding to aging issues.
... Previous studies have demonstrated that viewing natural elements from a residence or workplace is desirable and therapeutic for human health and well-being by reducing anxiety [36] and stress [37] and increasing creativity [38]. Studies have also shown that outside view content has a direct impact on occupant well-being [39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47]. ...
Article
Viewing the natural environment from inside homes and workplaces has been recognized by a range of scholars as having an impact on improving health and well-being. Research has shown that a combination of outdoor elements-such as blue sky, sea view and greenery-is highly preferred as these elements are therapeutic for human wellbeing. However, installing shading systems is an important strategy for passive building cooling but it could affect our sense of connection to the outside environment. Most researchers evaluate view quality using qualitative questionnaires or quantitative methods by analyzing the geometry outside using 2D and 3D software which needs the outdoor environment to be fully built in the simulation accurately takes more time and may cause a system crash to run. This paper presents a new facilitation tool to quantify the visible outside view (VOV) by analyzing the outside view image by converting the view content into red, blue, and green (RGB) pixels using image processing technique. VOV measures the occupant's ray tracking percentage to the visible outside view content taking into consideration the blind factor of shading. An indicator start from 0% to 100% is given to quantify the outside view content including shading systems which then the overall VOV is related to the visible outside view quality as a factor of well-being potential (WP). The study found that the shading strategy should not be the same at all levels and shading devices in primary design stages considering the view to the natural elements positively affects occupants' wellbeing potential. These findings suggest that the proposed algorithm needs to be implemented with building energy and daylight simulation to produce more holistic systems. This will be the only way to get efficient and sustainable buildings highly connected with the human dimension.
... The concept of detailability arises from vision's intrinsic capacity to provide the most instinctive means 122 by which individuals comprehend their surroundings (Ulrich, 1979 there is no longer any need to fill out questionnaires after questionnaires, and the visual presentation of the 125 corresponding scenes through the SVI allows the individual to make a direct perception assessment. Nevertheless, these studies have mainly been carried out on a small scale, focusing on specific regions 156 or places. ...
Article
Full-text available
The relationship between the built environment and human perception of safety is well recognised in a growing literature of urban studies. However, there is a lack of attention to gender differences in perceptions of place, particularly in studies that assess perceived safety using street view images (SVIs). This limitation hinders the comprehensive assessment of safety perceptions. Traditional analyses that combine gender or focus on men do not adequately address women’s specific needs to feel safe. To rectify this, the 60 participants were divided into two groups based on gender. Their perceived safety scores on 1,034 SVIs, and we used regression analysis to infer similarities and differences in streetscape elements that influence the safety scores between genders. Secondly, a machine learning model was trained, considering approximately thirty streetscape elements, and used to predict the safety scores of SVIs in the city. Finally, the spatial distribution of perceived differences between genders was visualised, and portraits of the different scenes were depicted. The results show that 1) both genders’ safety scores are mainly influenced by elements such as “Road”, “Sidewalk”, and “Car”, while the impact of “Bridge” varied between genders. 2) A high correlation was observed between the predicted safety scores for women and men. However, women deemed 63% of scenes unsafe, compared to men who considered only 23% of scenes unsafe, indicating a 40% difference. 3) The safer the scene is, the smaller the difference in perception between genders. Conversely, the more unsafe the scene, the weaker women’s perceptions of safety are compared to men’s. Our findings can extend the rules of urban safety assessment (serving women) and create an inclusive urban street environment.
... In general, we identified a clear trend: environments with more natural features, either acoustic or visual, had stronger positive effects on anxiety than those with a greater presence of anthropogenic elements. These findings are consistent with studies of the effects of natural elements on anxiety (Ulrich, 1981;Wang et al., 2022;Yin et al., 2020;Zhang et al., 2023;Zhou et al., 2020) and of multiple mental states, such as improved mood (Jiang et al., 2021); stress reduction (Zhang et al., 2023); psychological well-being (Ulrich, 1979) and mental restoration (Jahncke et al., 2015;Ratcliffe, 2021). However, two novel findings on how natural characteristics improve mental restoration are worthy of special attention. ...
Article
Full-text available
Anxiety is one of the most common mental health disorders in the world. Although acoustic and visual environments are known to influence many other aspects of mental health, we know little about their independent and interactive effects on the levels of anxiety of high-density city dwellers. We conducted a laboratory experiment using a two-way factorial design (four visual environments × five acoustic environments) and randomly assigned participants to 20 treatment conditions. Before exposure to a condition, they engaged in the Trier Social Stress Test to induce a moderate level of anxiety. A total of 223 urban dwellers reported their anxiety levels before and after a randomly assigned environmental treatment. The results showed that acoustic and visual environments had a significant interactive influence on anxiety relief. The impact of acoustic environments on anxiety relief was 4.67 times greater than the impact of visual environments. Environments with more natural features, regardless of whether they were acoustic or visual, played a greater role in reducing anxiety than environments with more artificial features. The combination of green scenes and fully natural sounds gave a significantly greater anxiety relief than any other acoustic-visual environment. The implications of these results for planning and design in high-density cities are discussed.
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Windows in the built environment serve many important functions like ventilation, daylight, views, and a connection to the outdoor environment. They also benefit the health and wellbeing of building users by providing relief from monotony, boredom, claustrophobia, and stress recovery. The impacts of view type and view quality on building occupants have been well documented. Views to natural environments are more desirable than urban environments while providing faster stress recovery. Although windows provide a wide range of benefits to building users, they also create an opportunity for visual intrusion, resulting in a threat to user's privacy. To maintain the desired level of privacy, users are known to operate window shading devices, resulting in the partial or complete loss of access to daylight and views. Precedent studies have identified space function as a strong variable that affects building users need and perception of privacy. Therefore, it is critical to study the influence of space function and view content on a users' perception of privacy and their preference towards obstruction or connection to the outdoors. This study uses an online survey with computer-generated panoramic images of virtual architectural spaces and subjective questions to investigate the influence of environmental variables such as space function and view type on perceptions of privacy, relative importance of view, and view preference. A total of four images were presented to a sample of 150 participants, the images were created to reflect two space function variables 'Hotel room' and 'Waiting room' and two view variables 'Forest' and 'Urban'. The results demonstrate that space function has a statistically significant impact on the perceived importance for privacy. Furthermore, participants agreed that Forest views were preferable to Urban views, but the degree of consensus was impacted by space use type, revealing the importance of considering space function and privacy needs in view-preference studies.
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Windows have always served multifunctional roles in buildings. Therefore, it has been observed that early assessment of the view can be beneficial for design decisions made in the initial design stage. This paper presents the preliminary research results aimed at evaluating the effect of urban configurations, namely average building height, building skyline, and road size, on window view quality. The research starts by selecting the city of Aversa (south of Italy) as a reference reviewing landscape metrics performed to characterize urban buildings and classify urban morphology. Eighteen urban configurations are modelled in the Climate Studio software, and the window view quality is evaluated according to EN 17037 and LEED. The simulation results suggest that for specific urban configurations (road size of 20 m, average building height of 12 m and variable skyline) it is possible to maximise the window view level according to EN 17037 and LEED.
Article
A landscape preference study, originally conducted in the United States, was replicated in Scotland. Ranked preference values for black and white photographs of natural landscapes were very similar for the two studies. Therefore the landscape preference equation, developed from data in the initial study, would have predicted quite accurately the landscape preferences of people in Scotland. Study results strengthen the predictability and versatility of the initial equation.
Article
A survey questionnaire of 250 residents of the city of Detroit was taken in 1979. Its purpose was to identify inner city attitudes regarding urban forestry and tree programs. The respondents demonstrate a high regard for tree programs as compared to other municipal services. Within parks, the specific attributes which respondents would like to see more of, show preference to more passive activities associated with trees and shade. Differences do exist across several characteristics such as age and race. Tree lined streets rank highest as important places for government to provide trees. Providing trees in parking lots, in industrial areas and in downtown areas ranked surprisingly low. Respondents state that trees would influence their choice of a place to live. When viewing color pictures and several scenes, responses to bipolar word pairs indicate strong positive feelings to trees. Specific tree programs favored most, are to plant more trees in their neighborhood.