Does exposure to pictures of nature boost attentional control in the Stroop task?

Augustinova, Maria; Banovic, Ingrid; Burca, Mariana; Ferrand, Ludovic; Iodice, Pierpaolo; Carole, Junker,; Vincent, Kernivinen,; Parris, Benjamin A.

doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101901

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Therefore, while both processes reflect aspects of executive control, they are dissociable constructs that serve different roles in how an individual attends to their environment. Interestingly, there is prior literature that similarly fails to find nature-related improvements in inhibitory control processes such as on the Stroop Task 77 and literature that does find improvements in performance monitoring 51 , 78 . This suggests that perhaps not all forms of executive control are comparably influenced by exposure to nature.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Immersion in nature enhances neural indices of executive attention

McDonnell,

Strayer

2024

Sci Rep

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There is conjecture that our modern urban environments place high demand on our attentional resources, which can become depleted over time and cause mental fatigue. Natural environments, on the other hand, are thought to provide relief from this demand and allow our resources to be replenished. While these claims have been assessed with self-report and behavioral measures, there is limited understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying these attentional benefits. The present randomized controlled trial fills this gap in the literature by using electroencephalography to explore three aspects of attention—alerting, orienting, and executive control—from a behavioral and neural perspective. Participants (N = 92) completed the Attention Network Task before and after either a 40-min walk in nature or a 40-min walk in a control, urban environment. Participants that walked in nature reported their walk to be more restorative than those that walked in the urban environment. Furthermore, the nature group showed an enhanced error-related negativity after their walk, an event-related brain component that indexes executive control capacity, whereas the urban group did not. These findings demonstrate that a 40-min nature walk enhances executive control at a neural level, providing a potential neural mechanism for attention restoration in nature.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%