Listening to Nature
5.2 Research on Listening to Nature
Human-Nature Research
There is a common pattern to much of the early nature research noted by medical doctors Eva Selbub and Alan Logan in their book, Your Brain on Nature.[1] Ancient and folk nature medicines (e.g., Indigenous and First Nation peoples, Egyptian, Roman, Greek, Middle Ages) are often labeled “pseudo-scientific” because of their claims rely on anecdotal evidence or scientifically unmeasurable phenomenon. Only later, sometimes after decades of research, some nature medicines are “proven”[2] by science. Selbub and Logan provide multiple examples of early nature medicine being proven later by science, including Roman physician Cornelius Celsus’ advice of walking the garden to improve health, Weir Mitchell’s 1874 “camp cure” (camping outdoors) for overworked urbanities, and nineteenth-century sanitariums designed to emulate nature for improving mental and physical health.
With the accumulation of nature-health research studies, such as Japanese researchers demonstrating scientific health findings for forest bathing,[3] there is a marked increase in the credibility of ancient and folk nature medicine. For instance, some doctors are prescribing nature activities for stress-related health conditions.[4] All of this is relevant to listening to nature because these nature prescriptions (e.g., walking in nature, outdoor camping, designing nature-friendly buildings) involve listening to nature (perceiving, interpreting, understanding, and making meaning) in ways that benefit our health and well-being.
Human-Nature Cognitive and Psychological Benefits
Some early nature research began with testing the influence of nature scenes on stressed students (after an exam) and found that nature scenes increased scores on affection, playfulness, and elation.[5] More recently, Kathryn Schertz and Marc Berman review the cognitive benefits of being in nature (what I’m calling listening to nature).[6] Their review includes survey, correlational, and experimental research with various nature-based stimuli (e.g., real-world exposure, images, sounds, and virtual reality). Summary results show nature-based cognitive improvements in working memory, cognitive flexibility, and attentional control.
An extensive review of the literature on the effects of nature, including large data-based studies (correlational, experimental, and field studies) and meta-analyses, support the positive benefits of nature on our well-being:
. . . brief contact with nature produces positive emotional states, green exercise (outdoors in green landscapes) has a positive effect on mental well-being . . . people were happier when in natural environments than when in urban ones. [7]
Nature connectedness, a stable pro-environmental attitude and behavioral trait, is significantly related to positive affect and life satisfaction in a meta-analysis of thirty studies with 8500 individuals.[8] Additional reviews of nature research reveal that: