Need to Focus? Try “Green” Exercise

Need to clear your mind? Sharpen your attention? Take a 15-minute walk in a park, The Washington Post reports.

All exercise is good for your mental health and wellbeing. Spending time outdoors lifts your mood, research shows. Now a new, small study of the neurological effects of “green exercise” — or physical activity done in nature — discovered a surprising new benefit:  even a short stroll in a green place improves working memory and concentration substantially more than doing the same brief walk indoors.

Exercise boosts brain power

“This all started with our walking meetings,” said Katherine Boere, the study’s lead author and a neuroscience doctoral candidate at the University of Victoria. Noticing how energizing movement can be, she and her neuroscience colleagues adopted the practice of walking and talking. As walking – whether indoors or outdoors – increases blood flow and oxygen to the brain and clears people’s minds, Boere suspected the meetings were more productive, but she lacked proof.

Indoor vs. outdoor exercise 

The new study involved 30 college students who took cognitive tests to assess their working memory and focus. On one day, they took 15-minute walks inside a building, and on the other, they strolled for the same time along a green, leafy path. When the researchers tested their cognition a second time, they noticed marked results. On the outdoor-walk days, students concentrated better and responded more quickly.

The findings are in line with scientific notions of how being outdoors affects our minds. According to one prominent theory, nature holds “soft fascination,” holding “our attention without demanding constant intellectual processing,” the article explains. It allows us to relax, to still our racing thoughts, and reset our attention so we can concentrate more fully.

“That’s why,” Boere explained, that she and her co-authors titled their new study “Exercising is good for the brain but exercising outside is potentially better.”

Where you walk matters

The benefits of outdoor exercise are blunted when you’re surrounded by asphalt and concrete. In a review of past studies, researchers found that exercising in urbanized outdoor settings — with few trees or other natural elements — had less benefit for people’s mental health than similar exercise in greener locations.

The intensity and duration of exercise matters too

The optimal time for a “green” walk is 15 minutes, said Claire Wicks, a senior research assistant at the University of Essex in England, who led the new review. Walking or jogging for 15 minutes in green spaces made people feel tranquil, but 40 minutes in the same environment felt draining.

If you can get outdoors, take the opportunity, the researchers urged. But if weather is prohibitive, just move anyway. All exercise is good for us.

“You may experience greater mental health benefits if you are able to be active outside in a natural environment,” Wicks said. “But, since physical activity is extremely important for our physical and mental health no matter what you do or where you do it, just keep being active.”

Read the full article here.

Or read the study for yourself.

 

Reynolds, Gretchen. “Why an outdoor workout is better for you than indoors.” The Washington Post, 12 Apr 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/04/12/outdoor-exercise-benefits/.

Photo by Chris Linnett on Unsplash