why walking makes you a better worker ?

“Come to the woods, for here is rest,” wrote John Muir, the 19th Century Scottish-American naturalist who was one of the earliest advocates of US national parks.

Muir spent large chunks of his life exploring Yosemite and the Sierra Nevada, and wrote prolifically of his belief in nature’s nourishing role, : “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul alike.” 

And it seems like Muir was on to something: there is mounting evidence that spending time in nature makes us healthier and happier.  

It’s something many people feel instinctively. But we’re busy at work, distracted by technology and often live in urban environments far from wild spaces. 

But what happens if we make time for an hour outside each day? Does it matter where we go, and what’s the value of shoehorning outside time into a busy work schedule?

Getting outside for as little as 15 minutes can have a large effect on your workday (Credit: Getty Images)

What does nature do for you?

There are some obvious benefits to going outside. You’ll have to stand up and move, which  if most of your day involves sitting in front of a screen. Research shows short breaks can boost engagement at work, and a quick break in natural light will deliver a shot of vitamin D.

So far, so positive. But based on a growing body of research comparing how we react in urban and natural settings, the kind of open-air environment you seek out matters too: green and blue spaces trump busy city streets.

“Generally the research tells us that when people are exposed to the natural environment and natural features, they tend to have a reduced stress response. When you are out in nature you have lower blood pressure, better heart rate variability, better mood,” says Lisa Nisbet, associate professor in the psychology department at Canada’s Trent University.

“There’s also a lot of work on the psychological benefits of being in nature – on wellbeing and on cognitive functioning. In general people are happier in nature. Happiness is a very broad concept and so we measure things like positive and negative emotions, people’s sense of vitality and being energised and also how satisfied they are with life,” she says. “When people are immersed in natural places, even in urban nature, people tend to have more positive emotions and vitality than when they are indoors.”

Japanese forest bathing, or shinrin-yoku, comes with plenty of surprising benefits (Credit: Getty Images)

The idea that nature is good for us has been gaining ground since the 1980s. First came the biophilia hypothesis, the theory that humans have an innate desire to connect with nature, followed by shinrin-yoku, the Japanese concept that absorbing the atmosphere in forests can benefit your health. Researchers of shinrin-yoku have since identified a raft of physiological and psychological benefits, while globally studies suggest time in nature can, for example, restore our ability to focus, increase creativity, lower the risk of depression and even help us live longer.    

Of course, many of us live in cities with no ready access to forests or wilderness. But as Nisbet says, it doesn’t have to be a forest – multiple studies have shown that green environments in cities have beneficial effects.

A five-minute dose

Jo Barton, of the School of Sport, Rehabilitation and Exercise Sciences at the University of Essex in the UK, works on “green exercise”, the idea that being active in nature delivers health benefits. In one study, she looked at what “dose” of nature was needed to deliver a mental health boost.
“Clearly we saw positive effects for all durations but the biggest was those first five minutes, just when you are looking at psychological health,” she says.The longer, the better, you might assume. But in the study of 1,252 participants engaged in activities like walking and gardening, Barton found that when it came to self-esteem and mood, the biggest improvements came in the first five minutes of exposure to nature.

She believes that the rapid boost may be driven by the transition to a green environment, and the way nature helps us switch from voluntary attention, which requires focus and energy, to involuntary attention, which requires minimal effort, allowing us to recover from mental fatigue. “Exposure to nature is really good at facilitating those changes very quickly,” she says.

Barton also found that the results were comparable across urban green, countryside and woodland environments, while the presence of water generated greater improvements. The take-home for city dwellers is that if you can’t get to a rural idyll for a hike, a short trip to your local park will pay dividends. 

It may also be a productivity hack. One study in Finland examining how lunch-hour activities help workers rebound from job stress suggests a short nature hit can boost performance. Researchers asked some people to walk for 15 minutes in the park and others to do indoor relaxation exercises for two weeks in spring and autumn, while a control group continued with lunchbreaks as normal. The results in the autumn intervention were interesting.