Have you ever felt calmer almost as soon as you step into the woods? Or maybe noticed your busy mind soften as you look out at the sea?

We have known for some time, and many of us sense it intuitively, that spending time in nature is good for us. Neuroscience is now enabling us to understand why, and what the brain is actually doing in those moments.

I was recently a co-author on a scoping review of the neuroscience of nature exposure, published in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, together with colleagues from the Universidad Adolfo Ibañez, Chile, and Imperial College London, U.K.

We reviewed 108 peer-reviewed neuroimaging studies on nature exposure and we found a consistent picture. When people spend time in natural settings (or even view pictures of the outdoors), the brain tends to show signs of reduced stress, lighter mental effort and better emotional regulation.

Increases in alpha and theta waves

Many of us live in environments that keep the brain on alert through traffic, screens, noise, crowding and constant decision-making. And while cities are awesome human creations, they place heavy demands on our attention and stress systems.

Nature, by contrast, seems to offer a very different kind of input, and the brain responds accordingly.

One........

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