Just two hours per week in nature can reduce emotional distress in children with mental health challenges, a new study has found.
About 20 percent of children and young people ages 3 to 17 have a mental, emotional, developmental, or behavioral disorder, according to the 2022 National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report.
A Dose of Nature
The research, published on Nov. 15 in JAMA Network Open, analyzed the effect of nature exposure on behavior and mental health.“The idea for the project came up during the pandemic when people were worried about the health risks of children spending so much time inside the school each day,” Marie-Claude Geoffroy, an associate professor in the McGill University Department of Psychiatry in Montréal and senior study author, said in a statement. “So, I thought maybe we can have a free and accessible intervention where school children can spend time in nature, and we can measure the effects this has on their mood and behaviour.”
