Abstract
Although stress is an increasing global health problem in cities, urban green spaces can provide health benefits. There is, however, a lack of understanding of the link between physiological mechanisms and qualities of urban green spaces. Here, we compare the effects of visual stimuli (360 degree virtual photos of an urban environment, forest, and park) to the effects of congruent olfactory stimuli (nature and city odours) and auditory stimuli (bird songs and noise) on physiological stress recovery. Participants (N = 154) were pseudo-randomised into participating in one of the three environments and subsequently exposed to stress (operationalised by skin conductance levels). The park and forest, but not the urban area, provided significant stress reduction. High pleasantness ratings of the environment were linked to low physiological stress responses for olfactory and to some extent for auditory, but not for visual stimuli. This result indicates that olfactory stimuli may be better at facilitating stress reduction than visual stimuli. Currently, urban planners prioritise visual stimuli when planning open green spaces, but urban planners should also consider multisensory qualities.
Highlights
Air pollution, noise, and a lack of restorative environments are more profound in cities than in rural areas[1,2], a condition that leads to stress symptoms in a significant portion of urban populations[3]
Participants were exposed to one of three multisensory environments in which physiological stress was initially induced in a stress induction period (Stress period) containing five mild electric shock stimuli
We report on a virtual reality experiment in which the participants were first exposed to a physiological stressor and recovered in one of three environments: a densely built up urban area, a park, or a forest
Summary
Noise, and a lack of restorative environments are more profound in cities than in rural areas[1,2], a condition that leads to stress symptoms in a significant portion of urban populations[3]. In 1989, Kaplan and Kaplan propose one of the more influential theories to explain the restorative effects of green space, Attention Restoration Theory[18] This theory suggests that visiting natural environments such as urban green space and parks reduces stress by stimulating involuntary attention and thereby reducing directed attention. It is obvious that we live and act within a multisensory environment, the physiological importance of multisensory effects on human perception and perceived stress in urban green spaces is not well known. Alvarsson et al used an arithmetic task as a stressor and compared stress reduction using skin conductance level (SCL) and heart rate variability[35] Their results suggest that natural sounds may provide additional restorative experience to the visual perceptions. It is a key research topic to investigate how our senses jointly enhance the subjective experience of nature, self-evaluated perceptions, and associated physiological measurements[29]
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