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The benefits of nature for our health have been an increasing research focus in recent years. In the context of a global increase in mental health diagnoses, the potential health benefits of nature have attracted attention. One practical nature treatment is to walk in nature. However, evidence for this practice on mental health has not been comprehensively appraised to date. This systematic review synthesized the effects of nature walks for depression and anxiety, and evaluated the methodological rigor of studies. Academic databases including ProQuest, PsycINFO, Science Direct, and Google Scholar were utilized to identify eligible articles, which were examined using the Newcastle–Ottawa Scale. Of 385 articles initially retrieved, 12 studies met all the eligibility criteria (nine pre-post within-subject studies, two quasi-experimental studies, and one experimental between-subjects study). These studies demonstrated that nature walks were effective for state anxiety but not generalized anxiety and the effects for depression were inconsistent. Findings indicate that nature walks may be effective for mental health, especially for reducing state anxiety. However, the quality of the included studies varied, and sample sizes were small, suggesting a need for more rigorous and large-scale research.

•This study showed that nature exposure decreased levels of perceived stress in 5 out of 6 studies.•This study showed that nature exposure decreased levels of physiologic stress in 7 out of 7 studies.•Nature exposure may have important applications in healthcare and public policy. The purpose of this systematic review is to evaluate the effect nature exposure has on stress as measured by physiologic markers and self-report. Researchers searched PubMed and JSTOR. Randomized control trials and cross-sectional studies were included if they met the following criteria: 1) included a clinical cohort and controls, and the intervention was nature exposure, either real or simulated; (2) utilized measurements of sympathetic activity or perceived stress; (3) study population consisted of greater than thirty male and female volunteers. Twelve studies were included for data extraction and review. Researchers conducted this review at University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine. Researchers measured perceived stress through the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale (DASS). Physiologic stress was measured by salivary cortisol, blood pressure (BP), subgenual prefrontal cortex (sgPFC) activation on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), skin conductance level (SCL), heart rate variability (HRV), muscle tension, heart period, pulse transit time, amygdala and pregenual anterior cingulate cortex (pACC) activation on fMRI, respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and pre-ejection period (PEP). This review found an inverse relationship between nature exposure and various physiologic markers of stress in all 7 studies measuring physiologic stress. Perceived stress was also affected by higher exposure to nature as indicated by lower self-reports on the PSS and DASS in 5 out of 6 studies measuring perceived stress. Nature exposure has been widely shown to have a positive effect in reducing stress, both perceived and physiologic.

Nature-based activities have been used as therapeutic interventions for those experiencing stress and mental ill health. This study investigates whether group walks could be a nature-based intervention to foster resilience, by buffering the effects of recent stressful life events on mental health. An observational research design with propensity score-matched samples compared the mental health of individuals who did (Nature Group Walkers, n = 1081) or did not (Non-Group Walkers, n = 435) attend nature group walks. A sub-sample of Frequent Nature Group Walkers (at least once per week, n = 631) was also investigated. Data were analyzed using multiple regression with an interaction term. All analyses were controlled for age, gender, and recent physical activity. Results showed that neither nature group walking, nor doing this frequently, moderated the effects of stressful life events on mental health. Using a main effects model, the positive associations of group walks in nature were at a greater magnitude than the negative associations of stressful life events on depression, positive affect, and mental well-being, suggesting an ‘undoing’ effect of nature group walks. Group walking schemes in natural environments may be an important public health promotion intervention for mental health.

Hiking in the nature is a modality of rural tourism that proposes that rural communi­ties organize circuits for commercialization of products. The objective of this paper was to analyze the social relations networks formed between the participants of this rural tourism modality in the Vale do Ivaí Territory, Paraná State, Brazil. Through intentional non-probabilistic sampling, 42 semi-structured interviews were conducted in 2015. The networks of social relationships that were formed on nature walks are based on strong and weak ties. It is concluded that there are strong ties in the subnetworks and that the weak ties are found between the sub­networks, which guarantees the fluidity and dynamics of the network. Caminhadas na Natureza configuram-se numa modalidade de turismo rural e pro­põe que comunidades rurais organizem circuitos para comercialização de produ­tos. O objetivo deste artigo foi analisar as redes de relações sociais formadas entre os participantes desta modalidade de turismo rural no Território Vale do Ivaí, Estado do Paraná, Brasil. Através de uma amostragem intencional não probabilística realizaram-se 42 entrevistas semi-estruturadas no ano de 2015. As redes de relações sociais que se formaram nas Caminhadas na Natureza são baseadas em laços fortes e fracos. Conclui­-se que a presença dos laços fracos garantiu o desenvolvimento das caminhadas, pro­porcionaram fluidez e dinâmica para a rede que forma o mercado das Caminhadas na Natureza, estabelecendo um fluxo regional de turismo. Los senderos de la naturaleza están configurados en una modalidad de turismo rural en la que se propone que las comunidades rurales organicen circuitos para la venta de productos. El objetivo de este artículo fue analizar las redes de relaciones sociales formadas entre los participantes de esta modalidad de turismo rural en el territorio Vale do Ivaí, estado de Paraná, Brasil. Por medio de un muestreo intencional no probabilístico, se realizaron 42 entrevistas semiestructuradas en 2015. Las redes de relaciones sociales que se formaron en los paseos por la naturaleza se basan en lazos fuertes y débiles. Se concluye que existen lazos fuertes en las subredes y que los lazos débiles se encuentran entre las subredes, lo que garantiza la fluidez y dinámica de la red.

Purpose: This one-group pretest–posttest, designed within a subject study, looks to compare the effects of an outdoor nature walk (ONW) to those of a virtual nature walk (VRW) on memory and cognitive function. Implications are discussed for education as well as for the world of virtual reality. Methods: Sixty-four healthy university students were asked to complete an ONW and a VRW, which was created using 3D video of the same nature trail used for the ONW. The VRW condition involved a five-minute walk on a treadmill, while wearing a virtual reality mask (Oculus, San Francisco, USA) that projected a previously recorded three-dimensional capture of the same nature walk they experienced outdoors. Both experimental conditions lasted approximately 5 min and were counterbalanced between participants. A Digit Span Test (Digit) for working memory and a Trail Test (TMT) for executive function were administered to all study participants, immediately before and after each type of walk. Results: For executive function testing (Trail Making Test), our results demonstrate that both the ONW and VRW condition improved the TMT time, when compared to a baseline (ONW 37.06 ± 1.31 s vs. 31.75 ± 1.07 s, p < 0.01 and VRW 36.19 ± 1.18 s vs. 30.69 ± 1.11 s, p < 0.01). There was no significant difference between the ONW and VRW groups. Similarly, for the Digit memory task, both conditions improved compared to the baseline (ONW 54.30 ± 3.01 vs. 68.4 ± 2.66, p < 0.01 and VRW 58.1 ± 3.10 vs. 67.4 ± 2.72, p < 0.01). There was a difference at the baseline between the ONW and VRW conditions (54.3 ± 3.01 vs. 58.1 ± 3.10, p < 0.01), but this baseline difference in memory performance was no longer significant post exercise, between groups at follow-up (68.4 ± 2.66 vs. 67.4 ± 2.72, p < 0.08). Conclusions: Our results suggest that both a virtual reality protocol and a nature walk can have positive outcomes on memory and executive function in younger adults.

How do we understand the boundaries of individual creatures? What are the systems of interdependency that bind all living creatures together? Plants were among the the first to colonize the planet. They created the soil and the atmosphere that made life possible for animals. They are some of the largest and oldest life forms on Earth. In spite of their primacy, Western cultures have traditionally regarded plants as the lowest life forms, lacking mobility, sensation, and communication. But recent research argues that plants move and respond to their environment, communicate with each other, and form partnerships with other species. Art, poetry, and essays by cultural anthropologists, experimental plant biologists, philosophers, botanists and foresters expose the complex interactions of the vibrant living world around us and give us a lens through which we can explore our intertwined histories.

Caminhadas na Natureza configuram-se numa modalidade de turismo rural e propõe que comunidades rurais organizem circuitos para comercialização de produtos. O objetivo deste artigo foi analisar as redes de relações sociais formadas entre os participantes desta modalidade de turismo rural no Territorio Vale do Ivaí, Estado do Paraná, Brasil. Através de uma amostragem intencional não probabilística realizaram-se 42 entrevistas semi-estruturadas no ano de 2015. As redes de relações sociais que se formaram nas Caminhadas na Natureza são baseadas em laços fortes e fracos. Conclui-se que a presença dos laços fracos garantiu o desenvolvimento das caminhadas, proporcionaram fluidez e dinâmica para a rede que forma o mercado das Caminhadas na Natureza, estabelecendo um fluxo regional de turismo.

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Stochastic optimization has been found in many applications, especially for several local optima problems, because of their ability to explore and exploit various zones of the feature space regardless of their disadvantage of immature convergence and stagnation. Whale optimization algorithm (WOA) is a recent algorithm from the swarm-intelligence family developed in 2016 that attempts to inspire the humpback whale foraging activities. However, the original WOA suffers from getting trapped in the suboptimal regions and slow convergence rate. In this study, we try to overcome these limitations by revisiting the components of the WOA with the evolutionary cores of Gaussian walk, CMA-ES, and evolution strategy that appeared in Virus colony search (VCS). In the proposed algorithm VCSWOA, cores of the VCS are utilized as an exploitation engine, whereas the cores of WOA are devoted to the exploratory phases. To evaluate the resulted framework, 30 benchmark functions from IEEE CEC2017 are used in addition to four different constrained engineering problems. Furthermore, the enhanced variant has been applied in image segmentation, where eight images are utilized, and they are compared with various WOA variants. The comprehensive test and the detailed results show that the new structure has alleviated the central shortcomings of WOA, and we witnessed a significant performance for the proposed VCSWOA compared to other peers.

The Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar Linnaeus 1758, is a charismatic, anadromous species that has faced dramatic declines throughout its range. There is currently a lack of information on the effect of free-standing bodies of water on a key life event, sea migration, for the species. This study extends our understanding in this area by combining acoustic telemetry with a correlated random walk model to try to examine potential morphological and behavioural factors that differentiate successful from unsuccessful migrants through Scotland’s largest lake. Consistent with other studies, we found that smolts experienced a high rate of mortality in the lake (~ 43%), with approximately 14% potentially predated upon by birds and 4% by Northern pike. Migration speed in the lake was slow (the mean minimum movement speed between centres of activity was 0.13 m/s), and pathways frequently deviated away from the outlet river. There was no evidence of a morphological or behavioural trait or migratory pathway that distinguished successful from unsuccessful smolts. This suggests that migration movement direction in the main body of Loch Lomond appeared to be random. This was further supported by the output of a correlated random walk model which closely resembled the pathway and migration speed and distance patterns displayed by successful migrants. However, once successful smolts came within ~2 km of the lake exit, a high proportion remained in this region prior to entering the River Leven. We suggest that this “goldilocks zone” is where directional cues become apparent to migrating fish. Future studies should combine random walk models with environmental variables to determine if external factors are driving the apparently random movement patterns exhibited by smolts in lakes.