It is generally accepted that natural environments reduce stress and improve mood. Since access to natural environments is sometimes limited, virtual natural environments, especially monoscopic 360° nature videos, offer a viable alternative. However, it remains unclear whether presenting monoscopic 360° nature videos via a head-mounted display (HMD) or a PC monitor results in larger relaxation effects. Therefore, this study examined whether a monoscopic 360° beach video presented with an HMD is significantly more relaxing than the same video presented via a PC screen, or no video at all (control condition), in altering skin conductance level (SCL), heart rate (HR), and perceived relaxation. Overall, 102 adults (40.2% females, age range 19–62 years) participated in a counterbalanced, randomized, controlled, within-subject experiment. All participants were subjected to three stressors comprising different mental arithmetic tasks, followed by three different recovery phases (HMD, PC, control). For SCL, the results showed a significantly larger decrease in the HMD and PC than in the control condition, but no significant differences between the HMD and PC condition. For HR, there were no significant differences between the recovery conditions. However, the HMD condition was rated significantly more relaxing than the other conditions, with no significant differences between the PC and control condition. Exploratory analyses showed that these results were not moderated by the participants’ age, gender, or technology anxiety. Overall, the psychophysiological results showed no significant benefit favoring the HMD over PC condition, although the self-reported relaxation ratings did. Future studies are warranted to clarify this divergence.

The replicativeness of nightmares appears to be a key variable for understanding the relationship between posttraumatic nightmares and PTSD, whereas nightmare frequency and distress appear to be more aptly defined as generic markers of mental health. (PsycINFO Database Record

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Despite psychological prevention efforts, military missions abroad often lead to mental disorders. Our findings indicate that the mild observed increase in incidence is both sex-specific and deployment-area-specific.

Significant predictors of suicidal ideation were a family history of alcohol abuse and pathological scales of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI). Suicide attempts were predicted by pathological MMPI scales, insufficient occupational education, family history of suicide attempts and the situation of basic military training.