Regulating effects of the biophilic environment with strawberry plants on psychophysiological health and cognitive performance in small spaces

Abstract

With urbanization, pandemic isolation, and exploration of deep-space and deep-sea, human beings will inevitably face the situation of long-term living and working in small spaces, which has negative impacts on people's mental health and cognitive performance. One of the solutions to these problems is to introduce biophilic design, in which plants are often the momentous elements. But research quantifying psychophysiological and cognitive benefits of edible plants is sparse. This inter-group study chose strawberry, a typical favorite fruit, to explore the impact of the biophilic environment with edible plants on health and cognition in small spaces. A subjective evaluation + electrophysiology + salivary secretion analysis method was adopted to discuss the mechanisms operating between biophilic environment and human psychophysiological and cognitive feedback, and reveal the laws of interaction between them. The results indicated that subjective emotions were significantly improved, and high-frequency power of heart rate variability (HRV), the power of alpha and beta brainwaves were increased, while heart rate, saliva cortisol, α-amylase and IL-1β were reduced in the biophilic environment with strawberry plants. Moreover, the results highlighted an improvement in cognitive performance by introducing strawberry plants into small space. Correlation analysis revealed that vigor was significantly negatively correlated with melatonin and response time, while histidine was positively correlated with mood disturbance and response time. Overall, these findings shed light on the positive regulation of biophilic environment with edible plants on people's emotion and cognition.