Analysis of Plant Type and Color Preference and Psychological Assessment for Gardening Activities of Firefighters

Abstract

Background and objective: This study investigated plant type and color preference and conducted a psychological assessment for gardening activities of firefighters in a high-risk occupational group. Methods: A survey was conducted on 117 firefighters aged 39.01±9.17 in Sunchang in March 2020 to examine their preferences in plant type and color and conduct a psychological assessment of firefighters on gardening activities. Results: For plant experience and awareness, plant-related event showed the highest score, followed by plant preference tendency and plant growing experience. The level of plant gardening activities was higher among older age and higher job position. As a result of examining the quality of life according to the demographic characteristic with WHOQOL-BREF (World Health Organization Quality of Life Assessment Instrument), it was found that the quality of life was higher among the 20s-30s than 50s, firefighter position than fire lieutenant or higher, those with higher average monthly income, and the singles group than married (p < .05). The administration group showed lower scores than the fire suppression group working in the field, showing statistical significance. Most firefighters showed high preference for herbal plants among the 12 types of flowering plants, in the order of Rosmarinus officinalis〉Lavandula spp.〉Mentha piperita, Calendula officinalis. Pelargonium spp. was preferred the least out of the flowering plants, Lycopersicon esculentum was preferred the most out of 12 types of vegetable plants, while Angelica acutiloba was preferred the least statistical significance. For the preference of plant colors, yellow was the most preferred color, followed by white, blue, orange, red, and green, showing statistical significance. For the psychological survey responses of emotion words toward 6 plants colors, it was found that 'bright' was the emotion felt most strongly by the white, yellow, and orange groups, 'calm' and 'comfortable' by the green and blue groups, and 'fancy' by the red group. Conclusion:The effect of agro-healing programs can be increased by using mostly yellow plants when creating indoor healing gardens at the workplaces of fire officials in a high-risk occupational group, and using herbal plants and Lycopersicon esculentum in the gardens for agro-healing activities.

The Effect of Police Officers’ Gardening Activity Level, Plant Preferences, and Key Variables on Resilience

“…The preferences were the highest for yellow (3.70 ± 0.84) and green (3.58 ± 0.86), followed by white, blue, orange, and red, showing statistical significance. These results were similar to the study results by Jang et al (2020b) that firefighters most preferred yellow in the plant color preference survey for gardening activities, followed by white, blue, orange, red, and green, and that police officers and firefighters do not prefer red plants, which is related to the fact that they encounter many wounds or bloodstains in scenes of accidents. Therefore, it is necessary to use yellow, which has high preference, as the dominant color for flower landscapes around the workplaces of police officers, while avoiding use of red with low preference.…”

“…For positive correlation, when plant color preferences increase, emotional words are mostly positive (e.g., 'concentrated', 'pleasant', 'relaxed', 'comfortable'), whereas when plant color preferences decrease, there are more negative emotions (e.g., 'distracted', 'unpleasant', 'nervous', 'uneasy'). The results of this study show that higher plant color preferences lead to more emotions such as 'pleasant', 'comfortable', and 'relaxed', which are supported by Jang et al (2020b) who analyzed the psychological effects of plant color preferences of firefighters and discovered that higher preferences showed positive correlations with emotional words such as 'pleasant', 'calm', and 'relaxed'. In particular, resilience of police officers showed a rather high negative correlation of more than -.56 with job burnout and stress level.…”

“…and the blue group showed 'cool'. This study reveals that the yellow, white, and green groups feel that the plant color is bright and comfortable, the blue group cool, and the red and orange groups fancy, which is supported by Jang et al (2020b) that the yellow group mostly showed emotional responses such as 'bright', 'clean', 'warm' while the green, white, and blue groups generally showed 'comfortable', and the red and orange groups tended to show 'fancy', and also by Song (2004) that the respondents showed high comfortable emotion in a space with green plants.…”

“…or herbaceous flowers (Eustoma grandiflourm). We used the images that had been presented in the survey on firefighters in 2019 to examine plant color preferences (Jang et al, 2020b). Color preferences were surveyed using total 6 colors with an image of a foliage plant for green and images of flowering plants for white, red, yellow, orange, and blue to be planted with plants (Fig.…”

Effect of Perceived Importance according to the Visual Image of Tropicalesque Flower Landscape on the Loyalty of Horticulture Majors and Workers in Related Fields

“…As a result of comparing the difference in plant-related experience and perception between general people and horticulture experts and workers in related fields who attended the tropicalesque flower landscape symposium (Table 3), horticulture experts and workers in related fields showed highest scores in gardening experience (5.69 ± 1.13) among the three factors, followed by plant-related event (5.47 ± 1.27) and plant preference tendency (4.92 ± 1.23). As a result of examining the mean of plant-related experience and perception of four previous studies on the general public (Jang et al, 2019(Jang et al, , 2020a(Jang et al, , 2020b(Jang et al, , 2022 Mean±SD (Horticultural person: N = 105, General person: N = 812). 7-point Likert scales, where 1 = extremely not; 7 = extremely so.…”