Does walking in nature restore directed attention?

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event Does walking in nature restore directed attention? Rachel Richardson1* and Alison Bowling1 1 Southern Cross University, Psychology, School of Health and Human Sciences, Australia Aims: Mental fatigue is commonly understood and experienced as mental exhaustion, irritability and foggy thinking. Research indicates mental fatigue is indicative of depleted directed attention resources. Thus, restoration of directed attention is thought to alleviate mental fatigue. This research sought to determine if walking in nature compared to walking on a treadmill provided enhanced performance on tasks of directed attention. Method: Twenty-two participants completed a 30-min walk on a treadmill and a walk in the local Botanic Garden on separate days. Two directed attention tasks (Rapid Visual Information Processing (RVIP) and Necker Cube reversal task) were conducted both before and after each walk as well as a Perceived Arousal Scale and a Positive and Negative Affect Schedule. Results: Total hits and sensitivity to a target on a RVIP task improved significantly in both locations F(1, 20) = 11.892, p = .003, F(1, 20) = 12.364, p = .002 respectively. However, there was no significant difference between the nature walk and the treadmill walk. Significant order effects were found for sensitivity to targets pre/post walks, F(1, 19) = 10.309, p = .005 and F(1, 19) = 8.578, p = .009 respectively. Necker cube baseline scores indicated a significant reduction in reversals after 30 minutes of walking in both locations. Arousal was higher overall in the nature walk compared to the treadmill walk, F(1, 20) = 11.626, p = .003. Conclusions: No evidence was obtained to suggest that walking in nature leads to improved directed attention compared to walking on a treadmill. Results indicate that improvements were due to significant learning affects. The significantly higher overall score on the arousal scale in the natural environment suggests that participants were more alert in this environment. Keywords: Mental Fatigue, nature, directed attention, Attention Restoration Theory Conference: 12th Annual Psychology Research Conference, 2015, Coffs Harbour, Australia, 25 Sep - 26 Sep, 2015. Presentation Type: Research Topic: Psychology Citation: Richardson R and Bowling A (2015). Does walking in nature restore directed attention?. Front. Psychol. Conference Abstract: 12th Annual Psychology Research Conference, 2015. doi: 10.3389/conf.fpsyg.2015.66.00018 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 23 Sep 2015; Published Online: 23 Sep 2015. * Correspondence: Ms. Rachel Richardson, Southern Cross University, Psychology, School of Health and Human Sciences, Coffs Harbour, NSW, 2450, Australia, r.richardson.15@student.scu.edu.au Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Rachel Richardson Alison Bowling Google Rachel Richardson Alison Bowling Google Scholar Rachel Richardson Alison Bowling PubMed Rachel Richardson Alison Bowling Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.