Literature Matrix Week 5

Article Title: Is physical activity in natural environments better for

mental health
than physical activity in other environments?
Authors: Richard Michell (Centre for Research on Environment,
Society and Health, Institute of Health and Wellbeing, University
of Glasgow)
Date: 8 May 2012
Citation: Mitchell, Richard. "Is physical activity in natural
environments better for mental health than physical activity in
other environments?." Social Science & Medicine 91 (2013): 130134.
Content: The author wanted to investigate the differences of
outdoor versus indoor exercise regarding effects on the body and
mind.
Objectivity: The study was funded by the
Scottish Governments Rural and Environment Science and

Analytical Services (RESAS) Division. No apparent conflict of

interest.
Manner Research Conducted: An observational study that made
use of already existing data from the Scottish Health Survey of
2008.
Manner of Presentation:
Strengths: Good use of tables to highlight the more important
findings.
Weaknesses: Observational studies can be a tad misleading,
especially for drawing inferences of causality.
Conclusions: The data seem to indicate mental health benefits
from outdoor exercise which are not associated with indoor
exercise. Experimental studies needed to confirm though.
Article Title: Walking in wild and tended urban forests: The
impact on psychological well-being
Authors: Drte Martens a, Heinz Gutscher , Nicole Bauer (Swiss
Federal Research Institute, Zrcherstrasse 111, 8903 Birmensdorf,
Switzerland)

Date: 26 November 2010

Citation: Martens, D., Gutscher, H., & Bauer, N. (2011). Walking in
wild and tended urban forests: The impact on psychological
well-being. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 31(1), 36-44.
Content: The authors investigated if walking in wild forests vs
tended forests produced different effects.
Objectivity: No conflict of interest apparent.
Manner Research Conducted: An experiment was conducted
where one group of participants walked in a wild forest and
another group walked in a tended forest, and various well-being
effects were measured.
Manner of Presentation:
Strengths: Well designed experiment that controlled for variables.
Weaknesses: A bit chaotic in the ordering of the information
presented. Perhaps two separate papers would have been better.
Conclusions: The authors were surprised to find the tended forest
was more restorative than the wild forest. This conflicts some

already-existing studies which found the opposite. Clearly, much

more research needed.

Article Title: Measuring the Unmeasurable:

Upholding Rigor in Quantitative Studies of Personal and Social
Development in Outdoor Adventure Education
Authors: Roger Scrutton and Simon Beames (University of
Edinburgh, UK)
Date: 18 December 2013
Citation: Scrutton, R., & Beames, S. (2013). Measuring the
Unmeasurable: Upholding Rigor in Quantitative Studies of
Personal and Social Development in Outdoor Adventure
Education. Journal of Experiential Education, 1053825913514730.
Content: The authors wanted to investigate the effectiveness of
using quantitative measures in studies looking at personal and
social development.
Objectivity: The authors received no funding for the article. No
conflict of interest apparent.

Manner Research Conducted: The authors looked at currently

existing studies and meta-analyses. Their aim was to find
common weaknesses in the quantitative approaches they used.

Manner of Presentation:
Strengths: A large number of papers were looked at. 22 recent
papers and 6 meta-analyses were used.
Conclusions: Some common weaknesses in the existing
literature were notices. Most common were :
the usage of inappropriate self-report questionnaires, low
statistical power, and over-reliance on inferential statistics. The
authors urge caution when using quantitative analyses.
Article Title: Evidence for a fundamental and pervasive shift away
from nature-based recreation
Authors: Oliver R. W. Pergams and Patricia A. Zaradic
(Department of Biological Sciences, University of Illinois)
Date: 17 October 2007

Citation: Pergams, O. R., & Zaradic, P. A. (2008). Evidence for a

fundamental and pervasive shift away from nature-based
recreation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
105(7), 2295-2300.
Content: The authors wanted to investigate if there is a trend of
lower outdoor recreation in recent years.
Objectivity: No conflict of interest apparent.
Manner Research Conducted: Statistics on national park visitation
were examined over the last few decades, with visitation rates
looked at particularly closely.
Manner of Presentation:
Strengths: Plenty of high quality graphs provided make data
visualization very easy.
Weaknesses: Looking at such a small number of countries means
the results may not generalize to the rest of the world.
Conclusions: There does seem to be a clear trend of moving away
from outdoor recreation, at least in the countries studied. Further
studies could confirm if it is a worldwide trend.