The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective

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Taste remains highly neglected in the context of nature experiences, and some interesting research avenues might include clinical studies on the emotional effects of eating processed versus natural foods, ability to distinguish between processed and natural food, and cognitive effects of diet. We have outlined the evidence that viewing nature both in pictures and through windows can improve health and mood; sounds such as birdsong and nature sounds provide restoration and enhance affect; smells provide numerous physical and psychological benefits; taste affects emotion, and traditional, natural diets have health benefits; petting animals can be very therapeutic; phytoncides can have a positive effect on our immune system; negative air ions affect our physical and mental well-being; and microbiota in the gut and the brain influence each other. We have looked at some sensory and non-sensory avenues, and it is possible that these pathways work in tandem or parallel, either synergistically, additively, or sub-additively. The recent decade has shown an increase in the research and practice of biophilic design that it has been included in the green building standards. Some of the most popular texts that have been published on this topic are mentioned hereinafter: Last Child in the Woods [ 23], Healing Spaces [ 24], The Shape of Green [ 25], Your Brain on Nature [ 26], The Economics of Biophilia [ 27], and, 14 Patterns of Biophilic Design [ 10]. Biophilia definitions Kellert, S. R. (1997). Kinship to mastery: Biophilia in human evolution and development. Island Press Nature might also make us nicer—to other people as well as to the planet. John Zelenski, PhD, a professor of psychology at Carleton University in Ontario, Canada, and colleagues showed undergraduates either nature documentaries or videos about architectural landmarks. Then the participants played a fishing game in which they made decisions about how many fish to harvest across multiple seasons. Those who had watched the nature video were more likely to cooperate with other players, and also more likely to make choices that would sustain the fish population ( Journal of Environmental Psychology, Vol. 42, No. 1, 2015). In another experiment, Zelenski and his colleagues found that elementary school children acted more prosocially to classmates and strangers after a field trip to a nature school than they did after a visit to an aviation museum (Dopko, R.L., et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology, Vol. 63, No. 1, 2019).

There may also be value in trekking to remote locations. In a survey of 4,515 U.K. residents, White found that people reported more connection to nature and felt more restored after visiting rural and coastal locations than they did after spending time in urban green spaces. Areas deemed to be “high environmental quality”—such as nature reserves and protected habitats—were also more beneficial than areas with low biodiversity (Wyles, K.J., et al., Environment and Behavior, Vol. 51, No. 2, 2019). In other work, White and his colleagues found that people who watched nature videos with a diverse mix of flora and fauna reported lower anxiety, more vitality and better mood than those who watched videos featuring less biodiverse landscapes (Wolf, L.J., et al., PLOS ONE, Vol. 12, No. 1, 2017). The right of 'he University of C bridge to print and sell all manner of books was granted by Henry VIII in 1534. The University has printed and published continuously since 1584.The Experience of Nature is, at last, such a volume. It establishes a basic understanding of nature experiences from window box to wilderness. Are some natural patterns better than others? Is there a way to design, to manage, to interpret natural environments so as to enhance these beneficial influences?

Awe blurs the line between the self and the world around us, diminishes the ego, and links us to the greater forces that surround us in the world and the larger universe,” he writes. In that way, awe can serve a dual purpose, improving our well-being while bringing us together. The Benefits of Experiencing Awe Biophilic design dimensions were first introduced in the book ‘Biophilic Design: The Theory, Science and Practice of Bringing Buildings to Life’ [ 1]. According to the book, there are two basic dimensions of biophilic design; the first dimension is the organic or naturalistic dimension, which represents the shapes and forms. The becond basic dimension is the place-based or vernacular dimension, which represents the buildings and landscapes connected to the culture and ecology of the local environment [ 21]. Park, J., Conca, K. & Finger, M. The Crisis of Global Environmental Governance: Towards a New Political Economy of Sustainability (Routledge, London, 2008).The time has come to think of making this material available in a more widely sharable form. The issues are not by any means wrapped up and settled. Nonetheless, there are at least two compelling reasons for taking this step. The first is that these many nature-related and nature-influencing activities - designing, planning, managing, interpreting - are going on right now, often based on little theory and even less data. Compared to the wellintended but often severely limited intuitive bases for decision making currently being employed, the results of these years of research and theory could make a positive contribution. Second, we feel the outlines of what is known and what needs to be known have become clear enough that it is time to invite others to join the fun, to participate in the process themselves. Biophilic design can incorporate nature into our environment and designs places of inspiration and regeneration that bind humans with their environment. Although it is hard to find a space that can accommodate all biophilic design elements, many contributory elements can enhance the space and well-being. It is more than just adding a plant or two to the space! [ 10]. A positive effect can be generated by filtered sunlight, planting, green walls, water features, natural textures and materials, and views of nature. If simply looking at nature can inspire you, imagine how living in an environment integrated with elements from nature can do? As a result, an important question comes up “Could we use the biophilic design patterns to increase the landscape efficiency?” And if so, how could it be implemented in existing landscapes to set up a sustainable approach in the Egyptian cases.

Good biophilic design is usually drawn based on the user’s influential perspectives which can be impacted by health conditions, sociocultural norms, past experiences, and frequency and duration of experience are some of the most common examples [ 10]. Acselrad, H. in The Crisis of Global Environmental Governance: Towards a New Political Economy of Sustainability (eds Park, J., Conca, K. & Finger, M.) 96–109 (Routledge, London, 2008). It remains unclear precisely which elements of a view of nature are beneficial, hampering the design of natural therapy interventions or of urban greenspaces themselves. Three quarters of studies only make a coarse division between “urban” and “nature” when studying the beneficial effects of nature views [ 18], and so we remain unsure which visual elements of landscapes are responsible for the benefits. It may be that only a combination of elements in a coherent scene confers benefits, or it may be that individual elements alone are sufficient. For example, the colours of nature could be important. Blues and greens, which predominate in nature scenes are low-arousal, low-anxiety, and highly preferred colours [ 25, 26, 27], while the gray colours of urban scenes seem to result in feelings of aggression [ 28] and dominance [ 25].From the present perspective it is difficult to believe that at the time we began this research program there were virtually no studies on the subject of this book. A great deal has happened since then, and the literature on the importance of nature is growing. In retrospect, we find ourselves surprised by the quantity of research we and our students have done in these two decades. The present volume focuses on this more or less coherent research program. Though we refer to the work of others as it seems pertinent, we have placed a higher priority on coherence and integration th Earth System Science for Global Sustainability: The Grand Challenges (International Council for Science, 2010). Xue, F. , S. S. Y. Lau, Yifan Song & Zhonghua Gou, B. Jiang, (2016). Incorporating biophilia into green building rating tools for promoting health and wellbeing Ryan CO, Browning WD (2018) Biophilic design. In: Encyclopedia of sustainability science and technology. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2493-6_1034-1

Chang P. J., Bae, S. (2017). Positive emotional effects of leisure in green spaces in alleviating workefamily spillover in working mothers. Int J Environ Res Publ Health 14:757 Touch is also rather poorly studied, and many of the references we reviewed were not directly about touch. However, there are intriguing indications that touching animals contributes to health and well-being, and we suggest that this be researched more thoroughly and experimentally where possible. There is also a significant gap in the literature with regards to touching non-animal aspects of nature, such as plants. There is no appropriate duration when it comes to the time of exposure to a pattern; ideal duration depends upon the user and the required effect; it has been verified that health benefits could occur in a time of 5 to 20 min [ 39, 40, 41]. When a little duration of exposure is required, a pattern is usually located along paths with high foot traffic; this helps in improving access frequency [ 10]. Biophilic design impact on health Fernando Castrillon, Psy.D., earned a masters in sociology from the University of California where he was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, and a doctorate in clinical psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) and is a licensed clinical psychologist. He is Associate Professor in the Community Mental Health Department at CIIS and is the founding Director of CIIS’ The Clinic Without Walls, an innovative psychotherapy clinic serving mostly working poor and immigrant communities who would otherwise not have access to mental health services.Growing your own food means understanding seasonality and having the experience of gardening, both of which are strong nature experiences. A study by Church et al. [ 178] showed that those who grow their own food are happier than those who do not, accounting for a large number of possible socio-economic confounding variables, but not demonstrating a causal effect. Food growing has been linked with a variety of benefits, including self-fulfillment, identity affirmation, self-help, and mutual support [ 179], and growing your own food contributes to food safety and tastier, better quality food [ 180, 181, 182]. In fact, wanting better tasting food was the top reason respondents to a study cited for growing their own food [ 178]. It can also be a very satisfying practice [ 183], promotes skill development [ 181, 184], and connects one to nature [ 185]. A final benefit of growing food, and the second most popular reason in the above-mentioned study, was economic savings [ 178]. Community markets with locally grown food have even been used to promote racial equality, as in the case of “Mo’ Better Foods” in the US [ 186], indicating that the benefits derived from food and taste can be far reaching, from the individual to the community scale. The expansion of food-growing from a male-dominated practice to a more equal and female-including practice has been studied [ 187], so it has implications for racial and gender relationships, and the local food movement (growing food locally) has been considered as a social movement [ 188]. Indeed, food ties us together and its use to bring people together socially is well documented [ 189, 190, 191, 192, 193]. Growing food or otherwise interacting in nature can bring us together socially and provide benefits, such as care farms [ 194] and nature-assisted therapy programs [ 195]. All of this suggests that community cohesion is one of the possible benefits of natural food. A biophilic landscape design in Shanghai, China By Kyle Saylor Hopkins B. S ., The Ohio State University, 2009 A thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Colorado in partial fulfillment of the requirements f or the de. (2014). Since Wilson published The Biophilia Hypothesis almost two decades ago; the biophilia term has expanded considerably and the final biophilic patterns were analysed to disclose emotional connections mentioned by Wilson. Kohn, E. How Forests Think: Toward and Anthropology Beyond the Human (Univ. California Press, Berkeley, 2013). Some limitations of our review are that it was narrative rather than systematic, and we suggest future studies take a narrower, more systematic approach that could focus on particular health or well-being outcomes, although at this stage it seems the literature would be too sparse for this kind of treatment of most questions. We also used correlational or preference studies in cases where there was little experimental research to show some of the potential sensory pathways for nature benefits, even if they have not been shown unequivocally. Our review focused on the benefits from nature interactions, but future studies could also include risks.