![]() Schools, universities and workplaces can work to “naturalize” their properties with trees and water. Consider the greenness of the neighbourhood when finding a new home. Consider active transportation through a park, use natural scenes for wall coverings, take a picnic down to the beach. Let your imagination go wild (many people with ADHD are highly creative, spontaneous, and energetic) as you consider ways to incorporate nature in your day. This resonates for me how many times has a walk in the woods provided clarity of thinking, better focus, and enhanced problem solving? But a walk, while a great first step is not the only way to add greenness to our lives. It appears that time in nature can be restorative for children and adults, for those with ADHD and those who feel mentally fatigued. (Note that this is complementary to other treatment options such as medication and cognitive therapy). Angela Chen at the University of Victoria which supported the findings that time in nature improved symptoms of ADHD. Robert Gifford, an environmental psychologist, and Dr. Jason Gilliland, child health geographer), and the other by Dr. Recently, the Lawson Foundation, a philanthropic organization to support the wellbeing of children, commissioned two systematic literature reviews, one by the Human Environments Analysis Lab at Western University (lead investigator Dr. Frances Kuo and Andrea Faber Taylor published strong evidence in the American Journal of Public Health that demonstrated symptoms in children improved, even controlling for residential and individual variables. So not surprisingly, researchers have looked at whether time in nature could improve the symptoms of ADHD. The burden is significant at a human and social level with estimates suggesting the cost of ADHD in Canada is 7 billion dollars per year. People with ADHD may show behaviours such as daydreaming, being easily distracted from tasks, talking excessively, interrupting others, being unable to sit still, poor attention to detail and difficulty with multitasking. In research published earlier this year, Dadvand et al found that children who lived in urban neighbourhoods with “surrounding greenness” had larger volumes of grey and white matter and also showed better working memory and reduced inattention in cognitive testing. In addition to short term emotional effects that restore attention and focus, long term exposure to nature can affect brain development in children. ![]() Subsequent researchers have validated the findings that time in nature can improve attention as noted in a systematic review by Ohly et al, published by the Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health. Who among us has not looked up into a tree canopy with its dancing shades of green, or been mesmerized by water spilling over rocks, or watched a hardworking ant carry a trophy much bigger than itself, and not felt moved? And in turn, refreshed. And most significant, people feel a sense of awe, of being deeply engaged, of being fascinated by the surroundings, that has the most restorative effect. ![]() In sharp contrast, being in a natural environment requires no intellectual effort, but provides a wrap-around multi-sensory experience. It recognizes that periods of extended concentration (such as working on math problems), over stimulation (for example, urban environments) and even under stimulation, are draining and lead to mental fatigue, which in turn can make one easily distracted and unable to focus on the task at hand. Much has been written about the attention restoration affect that time in nature has, since the theory was proposed by Rachel and Stephen Kaplan in the 1980s. ĭid you know that time in natural environments can help reduce inattentiveness and improve concentration? How does it work For approximately 5% of children and 4% of adults (conservative measures) these are symptoms of a neurodevelopmental illness called attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The consequences can negatively affect academic and job performance, health and safety as well as relationships with others. In fact, a lot of people find that they too, can be easily distracted, impulsive and inattentive, especially if they are tired or stressed. Anyone who has a dog knows that this single word will immediately distract them from whatever they were doing. This blog post was written by Nature Canada guest blogger Sherry Nigro, and is the second in a series of blogs on the effect of nature on mental health.
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