Go Outside: Your Mental Health Depends On It

Written by Aubrey Dawn Palmer

This summer your challenge is to go outside – a lot. Hike, swim, read on your porch, camp, fish, practice yoga in the backyard, kayak, go to the park, have a picnic, garden, ATV, and experience a number of other outdoor adventures. Feel the sun and the wind on your face. Bring your family with you. Leave your phones in the car.

Getting outdoors, whether just to sit on a park bench or free climb a cliff, has been shown to improve mood and mental health, having both short- and long-term effects (Bowen & Neill, 2013).

Mental Health

Wilderness Adventure Therapy (WAT) has been used for some time to treat mental health, substance abuse, neurodiverse diagnoses, and behavioral issues among adolescents and young adults. WAT generally consist of bringing a group of these adolescents/young adults into the middle of nowhere where they hike a significant number of miles each day, carrying all their gear on their backs, sleeping either under the stars or in shelters they’ve made themselves, learning to light a fire without matches, living on beans and rice, with no access to modern technology, having no way to shower or do laundry for an average of ninety days. During this strenuous experience, clients also work with a therapist. These intense WAT programs have significant success rates, 80% of parents and 90% of adolescents reporting WAT as effective (Aldana, 2000). WAT has been shown to be as effective as traditional psychotherapy in clinically symptomatic patients (Bowen, et al., 2016).

Most of us will never attend a wilderness adventure therapy program, but WAT relies on something very important. Being outdoors does much for our bodies, brains, behaviors and mental health. Spending time outdoors, immersing ourselves in nature restores our sense of self (Pearson & Craig, 2014) and promotes mental health (Bowen et al., 2016).

Less intensive adventure therapy (which would include kayaking, rappelling/rock climbing, hiking, ropes challenge courses, etc.) also provides significant short- and long-term improvements in anxiety, depression, stress, other mental health diagnoses, and emotional and behavioral issues (Bowen & Neill, 2013). Adventure therapy also helps participants develop self-efficacy, mastery, mindfulness, and problem-solving skills (Bowen, et al., 2016; Mutz & Muller, 2016). Participants are required to face their anxieties head on. Some of us may never participate in organized adventure therapy, but these are activities that many of us can participate in, and still feel the effects of.

WHY is being outdoors therapeutic?

Studies have shown that being outdoors in green spaces decrease levels of stress and depression, and improves cognition in kids with attention deficits. Natural environments can also restore directed attention, executive functioning, and improve emotional regulation (Pearson & Craig, 2014).

The beautiful thing about nature (aside from it being beautiful) is that is has a restorative, healing quality that, at least for me, broadens my perspective to help me realign goals, grounds me, relieves stress and anxiety, and re-energizes me. And though these might not be as scientific as research findings, my experiences align with research, and the reports of many who find the outdoors to be a perfect environment for self care.

How much do I need to interact with nature to reap the benefits?

So, being outside helps us be more emotionally and mentally healthy. But not everyone loves high outdoor adventure. So how adventurous do we have to be to reap the reward?

The passive observer still can undergo a restorative process from just sitting outside, but the more dynamic and physical one can be outside, the more potent the benefit. Immersion is an important part of benefiting from being outside (Pearson & Craig, 2014). Even so, in one study, those who took a 90 minute walk in nature experienced less rumination and improved cognitive processes including decreased depressive symptoms, increased problem solving and self-regulation, whereas those who took a 90 minute walk in an urban area did not report any of these findings (Bratman, et al., 2015).

This summer, get outside. Go have adventures. Your mental health depends on you taking care of yourself, and out in the sunshine, in the woods or on the water, is the perfect way to do it. Besides, it’s good to try new things.

Set aside specific time to be outside this week. Notice how it makes you feel!

References

Aldana, S. (2000). An Analysis of the Effect of the RedCliff Ascent Wilderness Program. Retrieved May, 2019, from http://www.wildernesstherapy.org/ Research/RedCliffResearch.htm

Bowen, D. J., Neill, J. T., & Crisp, S. J. (2016). Wilderness adventure therapy effects on the mental health of youth participants. Evaluation and Program Planning, 58, 49-59. https://doi:10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2016.05.005

Bowen, D. J., & Neill, J. T. (2013). A Meta-Analysis of Adventure Therapy Outcomes and Moderators. The Open Psychology Journal,6(1), 28-53. https://doi:10.2174/1874350120130802001

Bratman, G. N., Hamilton, J. P., Hahn, K. S., Daily, G. C., & Gross, J. J. (2015). Nature experience reduces rumination and subgenual prefrontal cortex activation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,112(28), 8567-8572. https://doi:10.1073/pnas.1510459112

Mutz, M., & Müller, J. (2016). Mental health benefits of outdoor adventures: Results from two pilot studies. Journal of Adolescence,49, 105-114. doi:10.1016/j.adolescence.2016.03.009Pearson, D. G., & Craig, T. (2014). The great outdoors? Exploring the mental health benefits of natural environments. Frontiers in Psychology,5. https://doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01178

 

 

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Aubrey-Dawn Palmer was born and raised in Farmington, New Mexico, and she has a bachelor’s degree in family studies from Brigham Young University. She has two younger brothers and is married to her best friend, Richard. In addition to her research on relationships, human attachment, and healthy sexuality, Aubrey-Dawn volunteers with her husband as a teacher for the Strengthening Families Program, is a research director for a counseling center, and works as a home counselor at a residential treatment center.