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Physical Discomfort May Be Reduced in the Presence of Interior Plants
Abstract and Figures
A well-known research report showed that being in a hospital room with a view of trees rather than a view of a building was linked to the use of fewer pain-reducing medications by patients recovering from surgery. The experiment reported here was designed to further examine the role of plants in pain perception. We found that more subjects were willing to keep a hand submerged in ice water for 5 min if they were in a room with plants present than if they were in a room without plants. This was found to be true even when the room without plants had other colorful objects that might help the subject focus on something other than the discomfort. Results from a room assessment survey confirmed that the room with colorful, nonplant objects was as interesting and colorful as the room with plants present, but the presence of plants was perceived as making the air in the room fresher.
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... Participants completed a 2-item bipolar adjective scale (Lohr & Pearson-Mims, 2000; measuring the perceived attractiveness of the scenarios. Items included "pleasant-unpleasant" to measure how physically attractive, and "friendly-unfriendly" for measuring how socially attractive the attributes of the environments are (Dijkstra et al., 2008;Park et al., 2013). ...
Perceptions of the walking environment can encourage or discourage walking for transport. However, the influence of the built environment (BE) on pedestrians' perceptions of the walking environment has not been fully understood. To address this gap, the present research investigates how BE characteristics of a suburban walking environment are associated with the perceptions of attractiveness (i.e., pleasantness, friendliness), safety, and security. Using a cross-sectional design, 995 participants reported their perceptions about the attractiveness, safety, and security of different suburban BE scenarios in Brisbane (Australia). Univariate and bivariate random effect ordered probit models were estimated to identify the associations between BE characteristics and perceived attractiveness, safety, and security whilst controlling for psychosocial factors. Results indicated that perceived attractiveness (i.e., pleasantness and friendliness) was higher for recreational areas than residential land use. Women perceived the walking environment as more pleasant with trees. The perception of safety was higher for recreational and vacant land compared to residential areas. Young pedestrians perceived that the likelihood of being assaulted/robbed/harassed at night was lower if they walked through an area with commercial and mixed land use. Women pedestrians perceived that the corresponding risk at night was higher in recreational areas. Overall, the findings suggest that urban design strategies such as increasing land use diversity and providing adequate trees enhance perceived environmental attractiveness, safety, and security, ultimately resulting in more walking for transport.
... Green elements can purify the indoor air, remove indoor pollutants and have a positive impact on the well-being of the occupants [106,107]. In addition, interior spaces equipped with plants are perceived as more pleasant, inviting, attentive and less stressful than interior spaces furnished with other aesthetic features [107,108]. ...
The primary objective of this research is to define a pedagogy framework for architecture Graduate Design Studio. The proposed pedagogy framework pursues the following three principal objectives: The first objective focuses on buildings and landscapes and the interconnection between them. Such connectivity facilitates a ground for walkability. The second goal is to incorporate green elements within buildings and landscapes with regard to increasing the percentage of available green spaces within contemporary and future cities, which may encourage human respect for nature. The third objective promotes the notion that contemporary and future built environments should be envisioned as environments wherein fresh local food can be cultivated, processed and distributed. It incorporates urban agriculture within buildings and landscapes. The Graduate Studio pedagogy focuses on the concept of social sustainability. The three mentioned objectives of the framework are in line with the core concept of social sustainability, which includes improving the well-being and quality of life of contemporary and future urban dwellers. Overall, the Graduate Studio envisions buildings and landscapes as pedestrian environments, as grounds where green elements are incorporated and local fresh food is cultivated. The mentioned framework has been implemented within the Graduate Studio. Four design project samples are presented as successful precedents.
... From the first studies of Wolwerton [6], until more recent studies of Pegas [7], Irga [8] and Darlington [9], all the research results have shown that the use of green systems for buildings (potted plants, cut flowers, etc.), with a specific focus on systems for indoor use, show a remarkable removal efficiency of measureable air pollutants. The analysis and study of the psycho-physiological response of users to the presence of plants has been equally thorough; the results have shown that the human-plant interaction ensures a rapid physiological stress reduction [10] [11] [12], registering an improvement of psychological [13] [14], emotional [15] and cognitive [16] [17] health. Some other researchers have focused their scientific interests on the active contribution of indoor living walls on some indoor parameters such as temperature and relative humidity. ...
Indoor living walls are important decorative elements that can recreate a natural garden in enclosed spaces. Several aspects are addressed by the scientific literature such as, for instance, classification, the effects on air quality and indoor temperature, greater aesthetic and psychological impact, and improved acoustic treatment of indoor spaces. The main objective of this study is to analyse the acoustic performances of a novel indoor living wall (LW) where plants are rooted in felt layers and grown in hydroponics with no growing medium. The sound absorption of different LW solutions was measured in laboratory (reverberation room). One of them was installed in a Test Building, where sound absorption and sound insulation were measured. The LW has been installed for about two years in the Test Building under controlled conditions of temperature and relative humidity. This gave the unique opportunity to test the sound absorption of the same living wall in the same reverberation room after about two years. The results obtained indicate that the sound absorption performance of the LW is stable, as long as the plants remain in good health. Moreover, an estimation was performed with a calculation model of the reverberation time of the room containing the living wall. Evaluation in real working conditions confirms that indoor living walls can improve the acoustic comfort of indoor spaces by increasing both the sound insulation and the sound absorption area, allowing to reach the optimal reverberation time values provided for by Italian regulations.
... For the general population, having window views to nature can enhance people's satisfaction with their physical environment and promote their perceived quality of everyday life (Kaplan, 2001;Kuo, Bacaicoa, & Sullivian, 2001). People's presence in a natural setting can reduce their physical discomfort and stress, enhance mood and emotions, and promote the sense of safety and overall well-being (Brook, 2010;Lohr & Pearson Mims, 2000;Stigsdotter et al., 2010), not to mention the various benefits of active engagement with nature, including green exercises, nature-based therapy programs, and horticulture therapy widely used for occupational therapy for patients with mental and stress-related diseases and for rehabilitation purposes (Corazon, Nyed, Sidenius, Poulsen, & Stigsdotter, 2018;Gigliotti, Jarrott, & Yorgason, 2004;Pretty, Peacock, Sellens, & Griffin, 2005;Söderback, Söderström, & Schälander, 2004). ...
... In the United States, the WELL Building Standard was developed in 2012, which emphasizes accessibility to nature for the health of people in buildings. Modern people who spend a considerable amount of time inside everyday [9] are interested in creating a pleasant and healthy environment, and their desire to introduce natural elements into interior spaces, as primitive elements for psychological stability and relaxation, is increasing [10][11][12][13]. Furthermore, subway users exhibit various use patterns apart from transportation, including meeting and resting; therefore, they are recognizing the necessity of environmental improvement through greening. ...
This study proposed a plan for implementing a pleasant and healthy indoor landscape in subway station space. To this end, it established a 3D landscape model of the subway interior by reviewing previous studies on indoor landscape and the greenness index of indoor spaces. Moreover, it investigated and analyzed psychophysiological responses of users to environmental indoor landscape design in subway station space. Subway stations were classified as underground subway stations and ground subway stations according to the presence of natural light inflow. The greenness index of indoor spaces was also divided into four types of 0%, 10%, 15%, and 20%. Through this process, eight 3D landscape models of the subway interior were implemented. In addition, this study investigated psychophysiological responses of 60 male and female adults in their 20s and 30s using the models implemented. The investigation result was analyzed based on a frequency analysis, the χ2 test, T-test, one-way analysis of variance, and multidimensional scaling, which were performed in SPSS Statistics 25. The results of this study can be summarized as follows. First, physiological responses of research subjects were analyzed based on their prefrontal α wave asymmetric values. The analytic result showed that the environment where interior landscape was adopted produced more positive effects than the environment where interior landscape was not adopted. Second, psychological responses of research subjects were examined based on their greenness index preference, awareness of interior landscape area, attention restoration effect, and space images. The analytic result indicated that, among eight 3D landscape models of the subway interior, they preferred the model with the greenness index of 15% for underground subway stations. In addition, they preferred the model with the greenness index of 10% the most for ground subway stations.
... Studies have shown that introducing plants and flowers into hospital rooms during the recovery period has a positive influence linked directly to health outcomes of surgery patients (Diette et al., 2003;Lohr and Pearson-Mims, 2000;Park et al., 2004;Park and Mattson, 2009;Ulrich, 1984Ulrich, , 1992. Therefore, blooming or green plants as well as colorful fresh cut flowers in a hospital environment could be a noninvasive, inexpensive, and effective complementary medicine for patients. ...
In indoor environments such as hotels, the light intensity is generally insufficient for managing plants, and flower buds often fail to open. Lamps placed above (downward lighting) take up space. We assessed the applicability of lighting from underneath (upward lighting) for the indoor management of roses. We grew plants indoors in dim light for 2 weeks under three conditions: 1) without supplemental lighting, 2) with downward light-emitting diode (LED) lighting, and 3) with LED lighting. We quantified photosynthetic components (chlorophyll and rubisco) and the maximum quantum yield of photosystem II (Fv/Fm, an indicator of plant health) to determine the effects of each treatment on the quality and photosynthetic abilities of the leaves. We determined the ratios of dead and opened flower buds to elucidate the effects of supplemental lighting on flower bud maturation. Management without supplemental lighting decreased the number of flowers and resulted in lower-leaf senescence. Downward LED lighting promoted blooming but also resulted in lower-leaf senescence. However, upward LED lighting promoted blooming and maintained the photosynthetic abilities of the leaves, including the lower leaves. This study shows a strong case for using upward LED lighting in appropriate settings for indoor plant management and LED-based horticulture.
Architectural drawing cannot exist without landscape. It is very important to teach young
students elements of landscape. Helping to understand surrounding space as good examples of composition is shaping aesthetic needs.
However handmade drawing will truly make a student immerse into space he is
picturing. Student is picturing not only what he sees but also his understanding and emotions involved in evaluation of surrounding area.
Authors showing how young people from the city are perceiving village landscape
composition and how education can change their way of understanding it. Popularisation of landscape composition can take place using different means however the simplest one usually get the best results, where drawing is simple and effective way to study countryside landscape.
Keywords: landscape, rural area, architectural drawing, landscape drawing, education
In questo libro sono descritti percorsi (itinerari come recita il titolo) realizzati attraverso l'avvicinamento della psicologia all'ecologia. Si tratta di un viaggio introduttivo, di suggestioni che si propongono di offrire al lettore una visione nuova della relazione con il naturale e aiutare a ricostruire il "senso di colleganza" tra uomo e natura. Gli orti, i giardini, il paesaggio vengono raccontati come spazi della nostra psiche piuttosto che semplici presenze del mondo. In tal senso la loro cura si esprime come relazione con noi stessi, come cura della psiche e della "casa comune".
La diffusione sempre più ampia del disagio psichico ha implicazioni di natura ecologica, come molte ricerche confermano e esortano la psicologia a non rimanere confinata nell'Io personale, nell'intrapsichico nella sua opera di comprensione dell'uomo e del disagio.
The effects of plants in the workplace on the opinions and attitudes of workers was assessed. Attitudes of employees regarding plants were favorable, and most surveyed agreed that plants in the office made it a more desirable place to work. Office workers were aware of the benefits, such as improving air quality, that plants provide. No behavioral changes in response to the addition of plants to the office environment were demonstrated. There were no significant differences between gender, position in the corporation, and age regarding perceptions of plants in the office environment.
This experiment measures the effects of indoor plants on participants' productivity, attitude toward the workplace, and overall mood in the office environment. In an office randomly altered to include no plants, a moderate number of plants, and a high number of plants, paid participants (N = 81) performed timed productivity tasks and completed a survey questionnaire. Surprisingly, the results of the productivity task showed an inverse linear relationship to the number of plants in the office, but self-reported perceptions of performance increased relative to the number of plants in the office. Consistent with expectations, participants reported higher levels of mood, perceived office attractiveness, and (in some cases) perceived comfort when plants were present than when they were not present. Decreased productivity scores are linked to the influence of positive and negative affect on decision making and cognitive processing.
This study documents some of the benefits of adding plants to a windowless work place - a college computer lab. Participants' blood pressure and emotions were monitored while completing a simple, timed computer task in the presence or absence of plants. When plants were added to this interior space, the participants were more productive (12% quicker reaction time on the computer task) and less stressed (systolic blood pressure readings lowered by one to four units). Immediately after completing the task, participants in the room with plants present reported feeling more attentive (an increase of 0.5 on a self-reported scale from one to five) than people in the room with no plants.
Drawing upon the scaling techniques of Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum and the factor analytic methods of Flynn, and Mehrabian and Russell, a scaling procedure is presented that will permit the researcher to evaluate the affective characteristics of the environment and various features it contains. Starting with a large number of adjective-pairs in a semantic-differential format, an analysis of variance is computed from the responses to each adjective-pair, residuals are computed, and a correlation matrix is developed. A factor analysis of the correlation matrix yields the “attributes” being measured and the weights for each adjective-pair. The scale is then re-scored using these weights and the resulting values serve as dependent variables for a conventional analysis of variance. Examples of scales for measuring thermal comfort, environmental spaciousness, efficiency, attractiveness, and overall quality will be presented as well as scales that have been developed for measuring the size, style and comfort of office chairs, the comfort characteristics of protective clothing, and the style and acceptance of mixing valves used in showers. A step-by-step procedure for the statistically unsophisticated individual is presented.
Sixty-four subjects (32 men and 32 women) evaluated environmental quality and thermal comfort in a 2 − 2 design involving 2 temperature conditions, 20.0°C (68°F) and 25.6°C (78°F), within a climate controlled chamber that was either decorated with plants or was devoid of plants. The results showed that on a scale developed for measuring Occupied Space Quality, a higher rating accompanied the condition in which plants were used to enhance the environment than the condition in which no plants were used. The plants, however, did not affect the subjective thermal responses.
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.