Biodiversity is key to the mental health benefits of nature

New research from King’s College London has found that spaces with a diverse range of natural features are associated with stronger improvements in our mental wellbeing compared to spaces with less natural diversity.

Published in Scientific Reports and funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and Wellcome, this citizen science study used the smartphone application Urban Mind to collect real-time reports on mental wellbeing and natural diversity from nearly 2000 participants.

Researchers found that environments with a larger number of natural features, such as trees, birds, plants and waterways, were associated with greater mental wellbeing than environments with fewer features, and that these benefits can last for up to eight hours.