Connecting children to nature brings less suffering, hyperactivity and behavioral problems

The city's lifestyle has been criticized as one of the main reasons why children are disconnected from nature. This has led to an unhealthy lifestyle in relation to active play and eating habits. Even worse, many young children do not feel well psychologically – they are often stressed and depressed. Sixteen percent of preschoolers in Hong Kong and up to 22% in China show signs of mental health problems.

Recent research shows that spending time in nature can bring health benefits, and many environmental programs around the world are trying to reduce the nature deficit and disconnect nature of the child in order to improve the health of children. For example, to monitor the implementation of the Parma Declaration commitment to provide all children with access to green spaces for play and physical activity, WHO set a goal of 300 meters. Interestingly, 90 percent of Hong Kong's population lives within 400 meters of such areas. However, despite the extensive adjacent greenness, families are not using these areas.

"We perceive a tendency in which parents are avoiding nature, they perceive it as dirty and dangerous, and their children unfortunately capture these attitudes.In addition, green areas are often unpleasant with signs such as" Avoid the grass ". said Dr. Tanja Sobko of the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Hong Kong. So far, it has not been possible to measure the connection with nature in pre-school children, mainly due to the fact that they are too young to answer for themselves.

A new questionnaire for parents of 16 items (CNI-PPC) to measure the connection with nature in very young children was developed by Dr. Sobko and his collaborator Prof. Gavin Brown, Director of the Unit for Research and Quantitative Data Analysis at the University of Auckland. The questionnaire identified four areas that reflect the child-nature relationship: appreciation of nature, empathy for nature, responsibility for nature, and awareness of nature.

The study consisted of two parts: the initial interviews with the families and the subsequent development of the questionnaire. In all, 493 families with children between two and five years of age participated in the study. Finally, the new questionnaire was tested based on the Questionnaire on Strengths and Difficulties, a well-established measure of psychological well-being and children's behavioral problems. The results revealed that parents who saw their children have a closer connection to nature had less suffering, less hyperactivity, less behavioral and emotional difficulties, and better pro-social behavior. Curiously, children who took more responsibility for nature had fewer pairs of difficulties. The results suggest links between the external environment and well-being in preschool children.

The study is part of the research-based program of Dr. Sobko, Play & Grow, which is the first in Hong Kong to promote healthy eating and active pranks with preschool children connecting them to nature. Launched in 2016, it has so far included nearly 1,000 families from across the country. (https://foodnaturelab.org/page/).

The results were published in a multidisciplinary Open Access journal PLoS ONE. The new scale has already attracted international attention and is being adopted by universities around the world, including the universities of Western Australia and Deakin. In addition, the Play & Grow program, developed by HKU, will be held in Australia.

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University of Hong Kong