If you don’t have time for a relaxing walk in the park, consider opting for a nature video as an alternative. A new study claims that watching nature on a screen could also help improve mental health.
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- What does the study say?
- Where was the study published?
- Why does the study suggest watching nature videos?
- How does the study was realized?
What does the study say?
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A recent research study found that watching even a short video featuring natural landscapes markedly improved viewers’ mental well-being, particularly compared to the impact of watching urban environments.
The study focused on the late adolescence phase, which has recently been linked to notable mental health problems, such as depression and thoughts of self-harm, worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The study authors wrote: “Adolescence is a time of multiple transitions and a period of vulnerability to mental health difficulties.” They continued: “There are many barriers to the treatment of mental health conditions…One approach is to use nature-based interventions (NBI) to improve mental well-being.”
According to the study, about half of all mental health disorders originate during adolescence, and about three-quarters begin by age 24.
Where was the study published?
The study was published in Nature: Scientific Reports.
Why does the study suggest watching nature videos?
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The study’s findings revealed that the group exposed to the short nature video experienced markedly reduced stress levels compared to the urban group. Furthermore, the positive effects on stress reduction were maintained over time and seemed to improve with each subsequent session.
Additionally, the group that watched the nature video also showed improvements in levels of relaxation and attention span. However, levels of depression, as the researchers called “depressive rumination,” showed no improvement in either group.
This implies that a short video may not be as effective as physically spending time in nature in terms of improving mental well-being, as the study authors suggest.
According to the study’s authors, these findings may have significant implications for communities with limited or no access to natural environments, particularly in low-income urban regions, prisons or medical institutions.
How does the study was realized?
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To evaluate the potential impact of these videos on mental health, researchers gathered 76 young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 and randomly divided them into two groups. One group was shown a video depicting a walk through a natural environment, while the other group watched a scene depicting commuters on a city train.
Each video lasted six minutes, incorporating audio relevant to the content, such as the singing of birds and the sound of waterfalls in the nature video, and the clamor of trains in the urban video.
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Source: vtt.edu.vn