Mental Health and wellbeing  linking to Garden

Mental wellbeing

Psychological therapy

For this project I aim to explore the relationship of human sense, and mental wellbeing, working with spaces

Human has five basics senses: touch, sight, hearing, smell, and taste, which is stimuli. The sensory neuron in our body, do to work of sending information to our brain. To help us understand and perceive the world around us.

Touching could sense the pressure, temperature, light touch, vibration, pain. “Touch can influence how humans make decisions, texture can be associated with abstract concepts, and touching something with a texture can influence the decisions a person makes…” according to six studies by psychologists at Harvard University and Yale University.

Sight, “people without sight may compensate with enhanced hearing, taste, touch, smell”, according to a March 2017 study published in the journal PLOS One. For my personal experience, I often close my eyes when I’m sensing the sound and temperature around me automatically.

Hearing sounds in a surrounding, allow you to receive information, in this case when I close my eyes in the garden, I can hear the wing and the sound of leaves colliding with each other, visitors chatting and the sound of a bird.

Smell, some humans can smell over 1 trillion scents according to researchers. Smells allow us to distinct differences in food and to feeling our surrounding like it sweet, fresh, smoky…

There is also an additional sense for space, that helps your brain to sense where your body is in space.  This sense is called proprioception. This sense includes the sense of movement and position of our muscles.

A reading about “The role of urban green spaces on mental wellbeing” by Victoria Houlden, a PhD student at the University of Warwick, studying Civil Engineering.

For today’s world statistics showing that one in four of us experience mental health difficulties each year, which is affecting the productivity and longevity for them proven by scientific researches.  Moreover, research has suggested this to be true in nowadays, where green urban environments provide better life satisfaction, therefore it is important that green spaces are designed into urban areas to provide places for individuals to connect with nature.

What kind of design and artist’s work related to Wellbeing Garden design.

Matt Keightley designed for the Wellbeing Garden at the new National Centre for Horticultural Science and Learning in RHS Garden Wisley, opening in 2020.

Keightley’s wellbeing garden will be a series of ‘Garden Room’, explore the many ways garden can be used for physical and psychological therapy, natural health care or relaxation.  He worked alongside RHS scientists to explore the impact of space on our senses and emotions. His aim is to provide a platform that will encourage visitors to consider how gardens and gardening can help improve general health and mental wellbeing.

A human interacting with nature helps our bodies heal, a research atTexas A&M University, found that patients recovering from gall bladder surgery who looked at greenery had significantly shorter hospital duration and took less pain medication, than a patient who looked out at a solid brick wall.