Psychological Benefits of Green Space… | Healthy Trees, Healthy Lives

Psychological Benefits of Green Space Increase with Biodiversity

Psychological benefits increase with the species richness of urban greenspaces. Moreover, we demonstrate that greenspace users can more or less accurately perceive species richness depending on the taxonomic group in question.

Fuller, R.A., K.N. Irvine, P. Devine-Wright, P.H. Warren, and K.J. Gaston

Biology Letters, Vol. 3, May 2007, pp. 390-394

Simply providing greenspace overlooks the fact that greenspaces can vary dramatically in their contribution to human health and biodiversity provision. Consideration of the quality of that space can ensure that it serves the multiple purposes of enhancing biodiversity, providing ecosystem services (Arnold & Gibbons 1996), creating opportunities for contact with nature (Miller 2005) and enhancing psychological well-being.