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A New Paper in Forest Medicine

Last Updated: April 15, 2011

Recently, a new paper in Forest Medicine has been published in Public Health by Elsevier as follows:

Lee J, Park BJ, Tsunetsugu Y, Ohira T, Kagawa T, Miyazaki Y.
Effect of forest bathing on physiological and psychological responses in young Japanese male subjects.
Public Health. 2011 Feb;125(2):93-100. Epub 2011 Feb 1.

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To provide scientific evidence supporting the efficacy of forest bathing as a natural therapy by investigating its physiological benefits using biological indicators in outdoor settings.

STUDY DESIGN: Within-group comparisons were used to examine psychological and physiological responses to exposure to real forest and urban environments.

METHODS: Young Japanese male adults participated in a 3-day, 2-night field experiment. Physiological responses as well as self-reported psychological responses to forest and urban environmental stimuli were measured in real settings. The results of each indicator were compared against each environmental stimulus.

RESULTS: Heart rate variability analysis indicated that the forest environment significantly increased parasympathetic nervous activity and significantly suppressed sympathetic activity of participants compared with the urban environment. Salivary cortisol level and pulse rate decreased markedly in the forest setting compared with the urban setting. In psychological tests, forest bathing significantly increased scores of positive feelings and significantly decreased scores of negative feelings after stimuli compared with the urban stimuli.

CONCLUSION: Physiological data from this field experiment provide important scientific evidence on the health benefits of forest bathing. The results support the concept that forest bathing has positive effects on physical and mental health, indicating that it can be effective for health promotion. Despite the small sample size in this study, a very clear tendency towards positive physiological and psychological outcomes in forests was observed.

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Completion Report Walking Forest Therapy Roads® with a Doctor in 2016 operation year.

Completion Report Walking Forest Therapy Roads® with a Doctor in 2016 operation year.