Nature Rx
A ‘Nature Drug’

A number of studies throughout the years have suggested that being in Nature has a myriad of beneficial mental health consequences.

Even on our own pages, we’ve talked about the new and emerging fields of “garden therapy” and “green exercise”. The former is a relatively new field of study and is currently being researched at the Royal College of Physicians in London, while the latter has been around since the 60’s and involves studying the various psychological benefits of doing physical activities outdoors. The activity of gardening is studied under both of these headings, and there’s a lot of good news about it. So, if you’re a gardener reading this post, our hat goes off to you. More people, including ourselves, should start to garden — or at least start planting. Gardening for just ten minutes a day has been shown to improve your overall mood and reduce stress.

Hiking, cross-country running, and nature walks, simply enough, have all been shown to share these mental and physical benefits. The study, The Mental and Physical Health Outcomes of Green Exercise outlines a few of these points.

To relate this back to the whole ‘drug’ question: the organization, Nature RX, made a few comedic ads that try to express these positive results. Although these commercial are somewhat satirical, their assertions are backed up by science. They also offer some research-based resources on their website. Watch their brilliant videos below.