Design changes that are FREE!
Some changes you can make to your home or office can have a powerful effect on your wellbeing but are essentially free. Here is a useful list for you The single most important...
The Design Plan
Deciding on what to design first when you’re conscious of the size of your purse. Even the most organized of us, the ones living lives ordered beyond even the imaginations of mere mortals, only have...
How to alter your VR experience
Here’s a question for you! Did you ever visit a virtual reality environment while in different physical spaces and think your virtual experiences were different in each real life place? Research indicates that you’re...
Early experiences affect us more than recent ones
Have you ever gone somewhere where you had a good time a few years back? Or revisited a place which was associated with a bad memory? It turns out that those early memories really...
Live near Greenspace – If you can!
The more greenspace we are surrounded by, the happier we are. Kwon and colleagues report that “By measuring the urban green space score (UGS) from high-resolution satellite imagery of 90 global cities covering 179,168...
Symmetry in Nature
Symmetry matters and can be good, even in natural scenes, but too much can put us off. We’ve previously reported on the implications of viewing symmetrical arrangements of things here. Damiano and colleagues report...
Colours and Taste
Regular readers of The Space Doctors will already be aware of the weird fact that the colours we surround ourselves with or look at while we’re eating affect how much we eat. for instance,...
Finding our way around after GPS!
Have we become so dependent on our SatNav? Researchers have learned that using GPS-type systems affects our fundamental ability to find our way from one place to another. Knowing about these findings may encourage...
Healthy Eating – Aided by Design!
The weather finally turning warm each year is a wonderful moment. It’s that time when we can leave our homes without the coats and sweaters that have encased us for months. Our moods near...
Design and Physical Health
Design can support physical health in more than the expected ways. Use of safe materials, ones that don’t off gas toxins, for example, is an obvious design-based route to physical health. Design can make...
Designing your Yoga and Meditation Room
Yoga and meditation are routes that lots of us take to getting and staying mentally and physically healthy. Anyone who’s done either knows that there are some places where yoga or meditation seems to...
High Energy Spaces!
Many of us do all that we can to avoid working out. We often use work as an excuse to avoid exercise—it seems many of us would rather spend time writing another report from...
Eating out!
Restaurant Design Eating out is fun, and restaurants are often create places to spend time. Restaurants are also designed to encourage you to eat, particularly items that have great profit margins. Design significantly influences...
Can a Scent change our Opinion? – “Science News”
If you want to be liked make sure you’re surrounded by lovely sweet smelling roses! That’s what this piece of research seems to reveal! Also the opposite is true, if you are trying to...
Moon Effects – “Science News”
So it seems that science is proving that we are affected by the moon’s cycle! Casiraghi and colleagues used “wrist actimetry to show a clear synchronization of nocturnal sleep timing with the lunar cycle...
Design in Movement – “Science News”
Move more! As a result of this study, why not make sure you put your walking shoes by your main door, so it’s easy to take up those strides and walk for a bit...
Green Buildings are Worth More! – “Science News”
So yes, the news we’ve all been waiting for! Things we knew anyway, that green spaces, green and environmental features are better not just for the environment, but also make us better creative and...
Colours Seen and Temperatures Perceived – “Science News”
The warmer the colour of the light around you, the warmer you feel. This might seem obvious, but studies continue to prove this the case, with significant results. So if it’s cold outside, maybe...
Soundscapes Matter – “Science News”
People with dementia are being given peace by creating personalised soundscapes for them. Talebzadeh’s work focused on “how a personalized soundscape can help those with dementia by providing clues regarding time of day and...
Value of Time in Nature – “Science News”
New research shows that the more time we spend in nature the more generous we are, it creates a sense of transcendence. Castelo lead a team that confirmed previous findings and determined via lab...
Scents Meet Virtual Reality for Wellbeing – “Science News”
Virtual Reality has taken a turn for the better by incorporating smell! There is a new report which uses views and smells to augment the virtual reality to create calm spaces in nature for...
Designing to Boost Brain Performance – “Science News”
This is a tough time to be a human. Humankind needs to creatively resolve a multitude of challenges in the weeks and months and years ahead. That makes this a good time to apply...
Home Office, Home Design Challenge
Creating a home office where people work to their full potential, and have a reasonable level of wellbeing while doing so, is a lot more challenging than heading off to IKEA and bringing home...
Learning Spaces – The Long Read
Our brains have to work hard to learn new things. The forces building the knowledge bases inside our skulls (we’ll talk mainly about learning information and mental skills here, not more physical skills) need...
Designing In Awe – Why and How
There may not be any broader mental state we could talk about in this issue, which focuses on designing to boost brain performance, than awe. The spaces and objects in our lives which are...
Living Your Best Life Minute – Shopping Tips
In this section, we’re going to initiate a new feature – how to use environmental psych in specific situations that you’re likely to encounter outside your home and office, as you live your life....
Helping Our Memory Work Better, Via Design
Design decisions can help our memories work just a little better. In this article, we’ll cover how design can support the memories of those of us with regular old brains, specific issues raised by...
Dealing With a Creative “Block”
For many people their creative pursuits, whether that’s drawing or painting or writing or playing an instrument or something else, are meaningful parts of their lives. For those individuals, when their creativity “stalls,” great...
It’s Time for Squishy
We love curves and squishy furniture is in right now and there’s a science-based reason it is! You might like to introduce some of these designs into your home right now as we emerge...
Red = Risk, unless you’re in China
Can seeing Red negatively influence Stock Market Liquidity? This is an interesting piece of research. We have written before about how the colour red influences our choices. In this month’s round up of Science News,...
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