People tend to report greater happiness on days when they visit natural spaces, according to new research published in The Journal of Positive Psychology. The study found that both green spaces like parks and forests and blue spaces such as rivers and lakes were associated with higher levels of happiness. This pattern held true for people with and without common mental health disorders, including depression and anxiety.
Mental health challenges, ranging from temporary distress to persistent conditions like depression and anxiety, affect millions worldwide. Treatment options, including therapy and medication, can be costly, difficult to access, or culturally stigmatized. Given these barriers, researchers have been exploring how spending time in nature might serve as a helpful and widely accessible supplement to conventional care.
Previous studies have shown that natural settings can support emotional well-being, especially by enhancing positive moods. These benefits have been observed across different countries and populations, but questions remain. How long do the emotional effects of a nature visit last? Do they influence the overall mood of the entire day, or are the benefits short-lived? Are people with mental health conditions affected differently than others? And do green and blue environments offer similar psychological effects?
The current study, led by Tobias Harvey and Mathew P. White, was designed to address these gaps by analyzing how nature visits relate to daily well-being across a broad sample of adults, including those with self-reported depression and anxiety. By focusing on how people felt “yesterday,” the researchers aimed to capture the emotional ripple effects of spending time in nature.
“There is plenty of research showing that people (often) feel happier and less anxious in safe natural settings compared to urban and indoor settings. However, there is little evidence concerning whether these momentary feelings have any positive spill-over afterwards or whether when we return to our busy urban lives we immediately go back to the more stressed and tense emotions often associated with these,” explained White, an assistant professor at the University of Vienna.
The study was based on survey data collected from 2,140 Austrian adults in October 2020. The sample was balanced to represent the national population in terms of age, gender, and region. Participants were asked about their emotional state the previous day, specifically how happy and how anxious they felt, using standard questions developed by international organizations. They also reported whether they had visited any of 29 different types of green or blue spaces during their leisure time on that day.
Green spaces included places such as public parks, woodlands, and meadows. Blue spaces referred to water-based environments like rivers, lakes, and wetlands. Each participant was asked whether they had visited any such location. Researchers also collected information on whether respondents were currently taking doctor-prescribed medication for depression or anxiety, which was used to identify those with common mental health disorders.
To better understand the impact of these visits, the researchers controlled for a wide range of variables that might also affect daily well-being. These included age, sex, employment status, income satisfaction, marital status, disability, and whether the day in question was a weekday or weekend. Measures of general life satisfaction and sense of purpose were also included to isolate the specific effects of nature visits.
About two-thirds of participants reported visiting green spaces the previous day, while around one-third had visited blue spaces. Roughly 14 percent said they were taking medication for anxiety or depression.
After analyzing the data, the researchers found that people who visited green or blue spaces tended to report higher levels of happiness for the entire day. This pattern held true even after accounting for other factors known to influence well-being. Whether or not participants had a mental health condition did not alter the positive link between nature visits and happiness.
“Supporting a positive-spill-over effect, when people reflected on their day ‘yesterday’ they reported being generally happier and less anxious on days when they had visited green or blue spaces than when they had not,” White told PsyPost. “Importantly, the happiness and anxious questions were asked before they were asked to report whether they had visited nature to reduce possible biases from being asked to think about yesterday’s activities.”
“Of course, we also controlled for other factors which might have made yesterday both more positive overall and increased the chances of spending time in nature (e.g. day of the week) and still found the effect. Importantly the associations were generally present for both the general population and those with anxiety and depression, shining a light on activities that people struggling with their mental health might engage in to help them manage their condition.”
However, the results for anxiety were less clear-cut. In general, visiting nature was not associated with lower anxiety. But a more specific pattern emerged when the researchers looked at people with mental health conditions. Those who visited blue spaces tended to report higher anxiety compared to those who did not visit nature, or who visited green spaces.
This finding may seem counterintuitive at first. However, the authors propose that it could reflect a form of emotional self-management. In other words, people experiencing anxiety may seek out blue spaces in an attempt to regulate their emotions. These environments may not eliminate anxiety entirely but may still offer temporary relief or a sense of control.
“Although we had not expected that people with common mental health disorders (e.g. anxiety and depression) would feel more anxious on days including blue space visits, this was found despite them also feeling happier yesterday,” White said. “One possibility for these seemingly contradictory finding is that visiting the blue space did not increase anxiety levels but rather people visited blue spaces to help them manage their anxieties earlier in the day. Unfortunately because we only asked them to summarize their feelings across the whole day (in keeping with standard practices) we are unable to test this possibility.”
The study also reaffirmed other known patterns. For instance, older adults and people who were married, financially comfortable, or reported higher life satisfaction tended to say they were happier. Those with disabilities or who reported lower satisfaction with life or income were more likely to report anxiety.
While the findings provide support for the idea that nature visits can improve daily well-being, especially happiness, the study has some limitations. For example, the research relied on self-reported data from a single day. This makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions about cause and effect. For example, while people may feel happier after visiting a park, it is also possible that happier people are more likely to go outside. Similarly, higher anxiety in those who visited blue spaces could mean that they were already feeling anxious and sought out water-based environments for comfort.
Future research could address these limitations by using more nuanced measures of mental health, collecting data across multiple days, and incorporating objective assessments such as GPS tracking or physiological indicators. Qualitative research could also help explain how individuals perceive and use different natural settings for emotional regulation, especially those living with chronic stress or anxiety.
“Currently, we are working on a large 4-year multi-country European Union funded project (RESONATE) that is testing a range of nature-based therapies for different populations and groups,” White said.
The study, “Happy days are nature days: visiting nature has positive spill-over effects for the entire day among people with and without common mental health disorders,” was authored by Tobias Harvey, Mathew P. White, Sabine Pahl, and Lewis Elliott.
