NEW Planet Ark report - Wood Housing Health Humanity
Download a pdf of the report here
The health and wellbeing benefits associated with
spending time outside in nature are well known
and have been studied extensively by the scientific
community and reported on by Planet Ark1.
These known benefits include:
• Increased happiness and self-esteem levels2,3
• Increased cognitive abilities4,5
• Decreased stress response, blood pressure,
pulse rates and cholesterol levels6,7
However increasing urbanisation rates mean that
people have less access to nature in their daily
lives and Australians on average now spend over
90% of their time indoors8. This coincides with
reports of increasing levels of obesity9 and nearly
half of Australians experiencing a mental health
condition within their lifetime10. As it is not always
possible to increase our time spent outside,
particularly in areas like workplaces, schools and
hospitals, understanding how to incorporate the
physiological and psychological benefits of nature
into our indoor environments is an increasingly
important area of research.