Abstract
The interactive role of the ecological, architectural, biophilic, and sensory qualities of outdoor and indoor spaces in the restorative experiences of urban inhabitants is little known. We analyzed the restorative influence on mood states and situational stress related to exposure to vegetation proportion, spatial extension, landmark salience, biophilic architecture, people density, street visual access, olfactory pleasantness, and noise of 65 public spaces in a Mexican city. The environmental qualities of these places were analyzed with multidimensional scaling (MDS), leading to eight space categories (e.g., historic squares with biophilic architecture, large parks, street scenes, and interiors with non-biophilic architecture). Ratings of the restorative potential, mood states, situational stress, olfactory pleasantness, and noise annoyance were evaluated on such places and modeled through a structural equation modeling (SEM). The model shows that the restorative influence of the environmental qualities on moods and stress was related to a decrease in experiences of negative moods and perceived stress, and an increase of positive mood states. Based on our findings, we discuss design guidelines, emphasizing the relevance of including vegetation and built elements with biophilic qualities to create restorative environments.
Highlights
Growing urbanization and modern lifestyles are associated with mental fatigue (White and Shah, 2019), chronic stress (Abbott, 2012), depression (Hidaka, 2012), obesity, diabetes, and hypertension (Egger, 2012)
By performing a multidimensional scaling (MDS) analysis (Figure 4), the 65 locations were grouped in eight categories of places, considering their similarity regarding the 12 environmental dimensions evaluated by the group of experts (Euclidean distances between data of the locations)
The utilization of MDS analysis allowed grouping the places in categories that emerged from the diagram on the basis of a set of environmental dimensions
Summary
Growing urbanization and modern lifestyles are associated with mental fatigue (White and Shah, 2019), chronic stress (Abbott, 2012), depression (Hidaka, 2012), obesity, diabetes, and hypertension (Egger, 2012). Several studies have provided additional evidence of the potential benefits of nature and nature-like infrastructure in common outdoor and indoor spaces (Bower et al, 2019; Martínez-Soto, 2019). The latter encompasses studies on psychological restoration and restorative environments, which have a long tradition of validating the psychological, physiological, and social benefits of contact with nature-like settings (Menardo et al, 2019).
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