Famous Furniture that’s mattered
Furniture regularly determines our mood in a space, with ramifications for our wellbeing, cognitive performance, as discussed in this article. In “The 25 Most Defining Pieces of Furniture from the Last 100 Years,” Nick...
Consequences of Time in Nature
Joye and teammates report that they “tested the ‘nature-as-reward hypothesis’, which suggests that superior cognitive task performance following nature exposure reflects a general performance improvement, driven by the reward value of beautiful things. ....
Tension and Tastes
Zushi’s team shares that “Prior research indicate that emotional states can alter taste perception, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. . . . The first experiment investigated how anxiety affects taste perception when individuals...
Curvaceous Houses
A November article in The New York Times talks about the many curving design elements in environments created by Polish Brazilian designer Jorge Zalszupin (Michael Snyder, 2023, “Wacky, Curvaceous Houses in Brazil That Feel...
Treehouses!
What could be more biophilic than a treehouse? In October, Tow Vanderbilt reported on the treehouses designed by Takeshi Kobayashi (“A Treehouse Builder Who Creates Impermanence: Japan’s Takashi Kobayashi Has Found Freedom in the...
Scenting and Branding…. yes this is a thing!
M. Brown, in a recent article in The New York Times reviews recent efforts by many to link their locations/products/services to specific scents in consumers’ minds (“When You Think About Your Credit Card, Does...
Nature and the Authentic you!
Yang, Sedikides, Wang, and Cai “formulated several hypotheses: (a) nature fosters authenticity, and it does so through at least four plausible mechanisms: self-esteem, basic needs satisfaction (autonomy, competence, relatedness), mindfulness, and positive affect; (b)...
The Science behind why soft sounds and touch affect us so positively.
Lohaus, Thoma, and Bellingrath report in a literature review that ASMR* “is associated with short-term positive effects on mental health. . . . for the roughly 25 to 30 percent of people who can...
How Women write about Nature
Researchers have learned more about how who we are influences how we write about nature; the same demographic factors likely influence thinking more generally. A Langer lead team found that “female authors tend to...
Does the first letter of your name affect your life decisions?
Chatterjee, Mishra, and Mishra share that “Nominative determinism manifests as a preference for a profession or city to live in that begins with the same letter as a person’s own name. . . ....
Loneliness and time alone
Danvers and colleagues learned that “spending more than 75% of time alone was associated with much higher loneliness scores. . . . people who spend very much or very little of their time surrounded by others tend...
Purple Street Lights?
Kwon shares that “Anecdotal reports of purple-looking streetlights have been popping up. . . . the hue of the light illuminating a roadway could affect how drivers and pedestrians perceive their surroundings as they...
Perception and visual clues – food
Lopez, Choi, Dellawar, Cullen, Contreras, Rosenfeld, and Tomiyama’s report that “Satiation can play a role in regulating eating behavior, but research suggests visual cues may be just as important. In a seminal study by...
Turns out that our smell sends communication signals
A Loos-lead team reports that “Although chemical signaling is an essential mode of communication in most vertebrates, it has long been viewed as having negligible effects in humans. However, a growing body of evidence...
Boring meetings and passive fatigue!
Nurmi and Pakarinen’s work “challenge[s] the commonly held belief that virtual meeting fatigue manifests as exhaustion (i.e., active fatigue) resulting from overloading demands and instead suggest that participation in virtual meetings may lead to...
How smell affects the colours we “think” we see….
Ward and teammates found that “Odors for instance are often perceived with visual cues; these sensations interact to form our own subjective experience. This integration process can have a profound impact on the resulting...
Hipification of Plants
In “Human Resources, for Plants, Steven Kurutz lays out the army of people out there keeping our indoor plants in good shape (New York Times, October 7, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/07/style/plants-jobs-creative-dcareer.html). The fact that there are...
What your Zoom background says about you
Wonder what to do about your Zoom backgrounds so you seem trustworthy? Read Lianne Kolirin’s article on CNN (2023, “The Zoom Backgrounds That Make You Look More – or Less – Trustworthy, According to...
What we can learn from Ancient City Design
Tom Seiple makes a good case for considering ancient city design as we move forward trying to resolve today’s design problems (2023, “Ancient Cities Have Lessons UX/UI Designers Can use Right Now, Fast Company,...
Nature improves Cognition
Vella-Brodrick and Gilowska conducted a literature review “examining the effects of nature interventions on the cognitive functioning of young people aged 5 to 18 years. Examples of nature interventions include outdoor learning, green playgrounds,...
Daylight reduces burnout
A team lead by Ziabari found that “The research question was to identify the connection between daylight, nature-view windows, and hospital staff burnout during Covid-19. . . . Three questionnaires were used: demographic, physical...
We take more Chances when we’re warm it seems…
Lundberg, Craig, and Peloza share that “Across four studies, we find evidence for a positive relationship between temperature and risk-taking, using multiple operationalizations of temperature and measurements of risk. . . . In particular,...
Art and Culture Differences
Trawinski and colleagues had British and Chinese people look at Western representational paintings and report that “Eye movements were recorded while participants viewed the paintings with each painting split into face, theme of the...
Designing for Gender doesn’t always work…
Dai and colleagues found that “It is common that marketers design and position pretty products more to female consumers than to male consumers, suggesting they generally believe that females have a stronger preference than...
Scents and Appetite!
Michels and colleagues share that “Before and after Trier Social Stress Test, 91 participants . . . inhaled one odor during 10 min: Scots pine, grass . . . or control (i.e., demineralized water). ....
Trees Reduces the Heat
Sahani and team determined that “Nature-based solutions (NBS) such as green (vegetation) and blue (waterbodies) infrastructure are being promoted as cost-effective and sustainable strategies for managing the heatwaves risks, but long-term monitoring evidence is...
Bergamot scents and Stress levels
Liu and colleagues studied the “effects of ambient bergamot scent on the stress levels of office workers by exposing them to the scent while stressors persisted as the workers continued to work on the...
Your Front Door Colour affects your House sale!
Zillow shares information on front door colours and home sales. During their study actual and potential home buyers answered survey questions: “Homes with a front door painted slate blue — a chalky light blue-gray...
How Gardening your front lawn promotes sociability!
Chalmin-Pui and colleagues “explore[d] why people garden in front gardens, how social cohesion may emerge from front gardening activities, and the health benefits of the presence of front gardens for residents and passersby. Front...
How Natural and Urban Soundscapes affect our Brains
Stobbe and teammates utilized functional MRI sessions and 40 natural and 40 urban soundscapes to probe “the effect of listening to urban (traffic and machinery noise) vs. natural (birds, water and wind) soundscapes on...
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