Thread by @stevemagness

THREAD- Why pro sports teams might want to have videos of nature playing in the locker room at half time.

The science of nature (even the virtual kind) and its surprising benefits on recovery, restoration, and resilience.

In 1984, psychologist Roger Ullrich found a strange phenomenon among patients who had surgery.

Those whose hospital window faced trees or a park recovered markedly faster and took less pain medication than those who had a view of a building.

researchgate.net/publication/17…

This effect carried over when scientists evaluated people’s own living conditions.

And not just for their short-term coping with stress, but their overall health. Have a view of some trees, you’re in luck.

Even if you are close by to green space, the benefits carry over.

In a 2015 study of the city of Toronto, having greenspace nearby provided health benefits equivalent to if you were 7 years younger.

Another study found that more greenspace nearby meant greater resilience to stress and lower levels of rumination and anxiety.

When nature is nearby, good things happen. sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

It's not just health, performance improves as well.

In Peak Performance, we detailed this phenomenon outlining research that showed that when people took a walk outside, they were more creative, and scored higher on a cognitive functioning test.

What’s going on here and how does this tie to performance?

1. Nature restores our battery. It improves our mood, decreases levels of inflammation, and hastens our transition from stress to recovery.

According to one theory, heavy focus on a demanding task drains our attentional capacities

Think: deliberate practice, solving equations, playing an intense game of football. We tax our attention, placing a high demand on our executive function.

Our cognitive abilities fatigue

Nature fills the bucket back up.

Trees, rivers, waterfalls, all capture our attention effortlessly and involuntarily, restoring our bucket without using resources according to the Attention Restoration Theory.

2. Nature can create a sense of awe, expanding our perspective. It causes us to zoom back out from a world that pushes us to narrow.

When we zoom out, we drag out thoughts and emotions with it. Our creativity increases, our tendency to ruminate decreases.

But what if you are locked inside in a concrete journal? Don’t despair.

According to research, simply looking at pictures or videos of nature for only a few minutes leads to better cognitive performance, and an improved ability to handle stress.

Our brain processes pictures as if they were right in front of us.

In Peak Performance, psychologist Jennifer Stellar told us “(These feelings) probably help to ‘switch off’ our stress response, in turn lessening inflammation.”

Nature helps restore our executive function, improve our ability to pay attention, and transition us from stress to recovery.

We obsess over recovery in the athletic world, maybe it’s time to put some trees or videos of nature inside our locker rooms...

For the rest of us, it means if you're stressed or looking for some creativity, the best thing you can do is go find some woods and go for a walk.

For society as a whole, we need to rethink the role of green space in our cities. It is likely vital.

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