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Search the scientific literature, and you\u2019ll find paper after paper reporting on nature\u2019s cognitive benefits<\/a>. Interacting with nature improves our ability<\/a> to pay attention and complete difficult mental tasks. Urban environments have the opposite effect. The nature effect is largely true across\u00a0multiple studies<\/a>\u2014even\u00a0with\u00a0short exposures to nature or\u00a0when subjects just looked at photos of wild places.<\/span> Green spaces<\/a> around homes and schools correlate to better cognitive development in kids and better mental function \u00a0in adults. Researchers have even documented physical changes to the brain with MRI scans: One study<\/a> found kids with more access to green spaces had more gray matter, which is linked to higher-level thinking and processing. Another<\/a> reported that simply showing people photos of nature improved connectivity between different parts of the brain.<\/p>\n The evidence that nature boosts brain power is \u201cextremely strong,\u201d says Marc Berman, director of the Environmental Neuroscience Laboratory at the University of Chicago.\u00a0\u201cOur interaction with nature improves working memory performance and executive attention performance\u2014those are the ones that keep replicating,” he says.<\/p>\n Executive attention, also known as executive functioning, simply means our ability to complete higher-level thinking. Being able to plan ahead, work toward goals, weigh complicated decisions, maintain focus, and keep control of emotions\u2014all of these skills fall under executive function.\u00a0<\/strong>Neuroscientists think these skills originate in the prefrontal cortex, the front part of the brain that was the last to develop, evolution-wise (and individually, too\u2014a person\u2019s prefrontal cortex isn\u2019t fully developed until about age 25<\/a>).<\/p>\n Every school day, Hendrix spends his forest time in a creek, on a hill, or in the woods on Woodson Branch\u2019s 30-acre campus. \u201cYou play in the creek\u2013today I built a dam,\u201d he says. \u201cThere are really good climbing trees, and you can build bridges. There\u2019s also a big hill that\u2019s really good for hide and seek.\u201d<\/p>\n The case for nature\u2019s benefits on the brain is so strong, Berman says, that the major research question has changed: \u201cNow it\u2019s about nailing down why.\u201d<\/p>\n As anyone who\u2019s spent too long staring at math problems or balance sheets knows: concentrating\u00a0on something gets exhausting. Not only that, but daily life for most of us is also full of distractions\u2014everything from an officemate\u2019s cell phone pinging to a flashing banner ad online to email alerts piling up to a screeching garbage truck out on the street\u2014that grab our attention, often inadvertently. Switching attention from one thing to another is also cognitively taxing, says Jason Duvall, concentration advisor and lecturer at the University of Michigan\u2019s Program in the Environment. \u201cWe don\u2019t really do multitasking, we do task switching,\u201d he says. \u201cIn order to do that, we have to keep each of those things active in the brain, so it can be recalled and we can return. For every task that we add, we get worse at any other subsequent task.\u201d<\/p>\nRejuvenate Your Brain<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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