Plain Language Summary: Being in nature and being emotionally connected to it work together to boost wellbeing and environmentalism.

By Ian Alcock, David Sheffield, Piran C.L. White, and Miles Richardson.

Read the full paper here.

More visits to nature can benefit mental wellbeing. These benefits are greatest for those who feel the most emotional connection to the natural world. But positive influence on environmental behaviour can be greater for someone who feels little connection to nature than for someone ‘averagely connected’. This study of the population of England found that, on the average, visiting nature and being connected to nature were good for mental health and also promoted environmental and conservation behaviours, but benefits were a product of nature exposure and connection working together. We accounted for the quality of people’s neighbourhood green and natural spaces – how good their passive nature exposure is – when we estimated the impacts of nature visits and nature connectedness. Our work emphasises the need to develop policies which simultaneously promote both access to nature and nature connectedness. For example, nature-based social prescribing, where people are advised to get out into nature to help with stress and depression, might work more effectively when people also develop emotional connections to the natural world.