Cargando…

Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels

Natural environments, compared to urban environments, usually lead to reduced stress and positive body appreciation. We assumed that walks through nature and urban environments affect self- and other-perceived stress and attractiveness levels. Therefore, we collected questionnaire data and took phot...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Menzel, Claudia, Dennenmoser, Fiona, Reese, Gerhard
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7698395/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33212963
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17228519
_version_ 1783615820685901824
author Menzel, Claudia
Dennenmoser, Fiona
Reese, Gerhard
author_facet Menzel, Claudia
Dennenmoser, Fiona
Reese, Gerhard
author_sort Menzel, Claudia
collection PubMed
description Natural environments, compared to urban environments, usually lead to reduced stress and positive body appreciation. We assumed that walks through nature and urban environments affect self- and other-perceived stress and attractiveness levels. Therefore, we collected questionnaire data and took photographs of male participants’ faces before and after they took walks. In a second step, female participants rated the photographs. As expected, participants felt more restored and attractive, and less stressed after they walked in nature compared to an urban environment. A significant interaction of environment (nature, urban) and time (pre, post) indicated that the men were rated by the women as being more stressed after the urban walk. Other-rated attractiveness levels, however, were similar for both walks and time points. In sum, we showed that the rather stressful experience of a short-term urban walk mirrors in the face of men and is detectable by women.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-7698395
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2020
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-76983952020-11-29 Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels Menzel, Claudia Dennenmoser, Fiona Reese, Gerhard Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Natural environments, compared to urban environments, usually lead to reduced stress and positive body appreciation. We assumed that walks through nature and urban environments affect self- and other-perceived stress and attractiveness levels. Therefore, we collected questionnaire data and took photographs of male participants’ faces before and after they took walks. In a second step, female participants rated the photographs. As expected, participants felt more restored and attractive, and less stressed after they walked in nature compared to an urban environment. A significant interaction of environment (nature, urban) and time (pre, post) indicated that the men were rated by the women as being more stressed after the urban walk. Other-rated attractiveness levels, however, were similar for both walks and time points. In sum, we showed that the rather stressful experience of a short-term urban walk mirrors in the face of men and is detectable by women. MDPI 2020-11-17 2020-11 /pmc/articles/PMC7698395/ /pubmed/33212963 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17228519 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Menzel, Claudia
Dennenmoser, Fiona
Reese, Gerhard
Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title_full Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title_fullStr Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title_full_unstemmed Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title_short Feeling Stressed and Ugly? Leave the City and Visit Nature! An Experiment on Self- and Other-Perceived Stress and Attractiveness Levels
title_sort feeling stressed and ugly? leave the city and visit nature! an experiment on self- and other-perceived stress and attractiveness levels
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7698395/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33212963
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17228519
work_keys_str_mv AT menzelclaudia feelingstressedanduglyleavethecityandvisitnatureanexperimentonselfandotherperceivedstressandattractivenesslevels
AT dennenmoserfiona feelingstressedanduglyleavethecityandvisitnatureanexperimentonselfandotherperceivedstressandattractivenesslevels
AT reesegerhard feelingstressedanduglyleavethecityandvisitnatureanexperimentonselfandotherperceivedstressandattractivenesslevels