The Restorative Effect of the Presence of Greenery on the Classroom in Children’s Cognitive Performance

Abstract

Studies developed in a scholar context report a restorative effect of nature on human beings, specifically in terms of the psychological recovery from attention fatigue and restored mental resources that were previously spent in activities that require attention. Studies usually compare the performance of children in schools with or without access to green spaces. In this study, the effect of introducing greenery into the classroom context was compared across time. The experiment was developed in two primary schools with pupils in different socioeconomic contexts, at three moments: before introducing an artificial green wall into the classroom, one month later, and one month after the introduction of vegetable pots. Results showed a significant increase in sustained and selective attention, and work memory between the experimental and the control group, notably in the third moment when vegetable pots were introduced. In the second moment (green walls), only the work memory (tested with the inversed number) showed a significant effect. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed in terms of nature’s role both in terms of natural and artificial elements and the cumulative effect of direct interaction with natural elements.

School-Based Interventions to Support Healthy Indoor and Outdoor Environments for Children: A Systematic Review

“…Finally, 30 studies met the eligibility criteria and were included in the review. Additionally, 9 papers were identified via the snowballing process, totalizing 39 studies: 10 targeting Air Pollution [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50], 17 on Green Spaces [51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67], and 12 on Active Travel to school [68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77][78][79]. No eligible intervention to reduce road or air traffic noise at school was found.…”

“…The total number of children reported in the papers ranged from 25 [63] to 57,096 [72] with a mean age of 9.1 years. The age range of children included in the evaluation was not specified in 10 studies, particularly from active travel interventions which usually evaluated aggregated data from K8 schools (5-14 years old) [42,54,64,[67][68][69][70][71]74,77]. However, all these studies informed the grades that ranged from 2nd to 6th.…”

“…In total, 16 of the 39 studies were implemented in Europe, including Denmark [50,79], Germany [49], Italy [61], The Netherlands [47,48,65,66], Portugal [67], Spain [42], Sweden [44,55], and the United Kingdom [45,60,62,63]. Most of the active travel interventions were…”

“…In total, 16 of the 39 studies were implemented in Europe, including Denmark [50,79], Germany [49], Italy [61], The Netherlands [47,48,65,66], Portugal [67], Spain [42], Sweden [44,55], and the United Kingdom [45,60,62,63]. Most of the active travel interventions were conducted outside Europe, including the United States [68][69][70][71]74], Canada [75,77,78] and New Zeeland [72,73,76] Two interventions were held in Seoul, Korea [41,59], and one in Victoria, Australia [51].…”

“…The level of intervention implementation varied substantially across studies, from classroom level for all air pollution interventions [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50]; at classroom [54][55][56][57][58][59][60]66,67] or school levels [51][52][53][61][62][63][64][65] for green spaces interventions. Most active travel studies involved national-wide programs evaluated at school [76,79], district [69], region [72,73], province [75], and state or multistate [68,70,71,77,78] levels.…”