This study examined how the aesthetics and setting (nature vs urban) of restorative environments impact affect, cognition, and fatigue. Participants completed pre-and post-tests of mood, attention, memory, and tiredness after viewing attractive or unattractive nature or urban images. Results found that nature may help maintain positive affect compared to urban settings. Tiredness was lowest in attractive nature settings. However, the study did not fully replicate prior findings that nature is more restorative than urban environments. Aesthetics quality did not significantly impact restoration. Overall, the findings suggest that nature may provide some restoration benefits compared to urban settings.

1. RESULTS
• Main effects of time: From pre-test to post-test,
Is It Still Good If It Looks Bad?
The Nature of Aesthetics in Restorative Environments
Meg Giblin, Anh T. Nguyen, Meng Zhao, & Raymond Chung
Department of Psychology Faculty Advisor: Jen Coane
INTRODUCTION
• Directed attention:
o Controlled and effortful type of attention
o Necessary for information to be encoded into memory
o Prolonged use  mental fatigue (Kaplan, 1995)
• Attention, memory, and fatigue:
o Impaired or divided attention at encoding  decreases in
memory (e.g., Brown & Craik, 2000; Craik et al., 1996)
o Free recall depends on controlled processes, hence on
attentional resources (Craik et al., 1996)  fatigue
• Stress Reduction Theory (SRT; Ulrich et al., 1991):
o Natural settings help relieve negative affect (e.g., anger,
stress), and bring about or increase positive affect (e.g.,
calmness, happiness, comfort).
o These changes are accompanied by boosts in cognitive
processes such as sustained attention.
• Attention Restoration Theory (ART; Kaplan, 1995):
o Exposure to nature can restore attention
• Directed attention in particular
• Criteria for a restorative environment (Kaplan, 1995):
o Being away - being in a new setting, detached from
one’s old thoughts and worries
o Extent - richness and coherence of the environment
o Compatibility - fit between the demands of the
environment and one’s purposes
o Fascination - the environment’s ability to automatically
and effortlessly capture attention, allowing directed
attention to rest and restore
• Nature can be restorative regardless of whether the exposure
is real (e.g., walking in nature) or simulated (e.g., viewing
pictures of nature) [Bratman et al., 2012].
• Berman et al., (2008):
• Not all natural environments (e.g., monotonic beaches
and oceans; Emfield & Neider, 2014) are restorative.
o Low mystery  low perceived fascination (cf. Szolosi et
al., 2014)
• Aesthetics:
o Nature is usually considered more attractive than urban
environments (e.g., Ulrich, 1981).
o Lack of unusual or unique features  low aesthetic value
(Skrivanova & Kalivoda, 2010)
METHOD
• Research questions:
o Is nature indeed more restorative than urban settings?
o Does the aesthetics quality of a setting affect its restorative power?
• Is unattractive nature still restorative?
• Can attractive urban settings be restorative?
• IVs:
o Setting (between-subjects): nature, urban
o Aesthetics (between-subjects):
• Attractive (pilot data: Mattractiveness = 5.01, Mthreat = 2.86)
• Unattractive (pilot data: Mattractiveness = 3.27, Mthreat = 2.19)
• DVs:
o Scores on various affective and cognitive measures:
• Procedure:
• Conditions (each condition: n = 20):
1. Stress (Cohen et al., 1983)
2. Affect (Watson et al., 1988)
3. Tiredness (Mueller & Piper, 2014)
4. Short-term memory (Wechsler,
1974)
5. Directed attention (Fan et al., 2002)
6. Connectedness to Nature
(CNS; Mayer & Frantz,
2004)
7. Long-term memory
List 1 (retroactive
interference)
List 2 (restored encoding)
Pre-test
Restoration
Phase
Post-test
Attractive Unattractive
NatureUrban
Figure 1. Positive affect as a function of time and setting
Time x Setting interaction, F (1, 76) = 9.63, p = .003,
partial η2= .11. No simple effects, ps > .06.
Figure 2. Tiredness as a function of aesthetics and setting
Aesthetics x Setting interaction: F (1, 76) = 5.08, p =
.027, partial η2= .06. No simple effects, ps > .51
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
Pre-test Post-test
PositiveAffectScore
Positive Affect
Nature Urban
p < .001
0
20
40
60
80
100
Attractive Unattractive
TirednessScore
Tiredness
Nature Urban
DISCUSSION
• In general, we were not able to replicate Berman et al.’s
(2008) finding that nature is more restorative than
urban settings. Our null effects, however, were
consistent with Emfield and Neider’s (2014) results.
• Though not statistically significant, nature appeared to
help buffer against decreases in positive affect.
• The aesthetic quality of a setting does not affect its
restorative power.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• Part of the stimuli came from Berman et al. (2008).
• Thanks to Professor Jen Coane for her assistance
throughout the research.
o Positive affect (Figure 1)
o Tiredness , F (1, 76) = 29.01,
p < .001, partial η2= .28.
o ANT accuracy , F
(1, 76) = 6.94, p =
.01, partial η2= .08.
o Pre-test:
• See DVs 1-5.
• Word list 1
o Mood
o Directed attention
o Short-term memory
o Post-test:
• Word list 2
• DVs 1-5 + CNS
• Recall
o Image
pleasantness
ratings