We are the Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health, or ACAMH for short. And this is ACAMH learn. Hello and welcome to the Mind the Kids podcast series. I'm Mark Tebbs. I'm your host for today. I've spent my whole career working in mental health from frontline services through to director of mental health commissioning in the charity sector, NHS, and social care. I'm currently chief executive of a infrastructure charity. So I'm really interested in how we support grassroots organisations and that kind of community impact. And I guess that background in commissioning makes me really interested around how we understand need, lived experience, evidence practise, and how we really measure impact and value for money. And I'm also a parent and have seen the system from a parent's perspective, too. So I'm really delighted to be hosting in the podcast. In these episodes we have the opportunity to talk to researchers and practitioners about their research. It's an opportunity to talk and shine a light on some of the latest developments in child and adolescent mental health research. Today, I'm going to be talking about nature connectedness. So how nature connectedness supports learning and well-being and how we can create opportunities for that felt experience. So I'm delighted to be joined by Nicole Harris, who's the lead author of a recent systematic literature review on nature connectedness. Nicole, it's great to be speaking with you. Oh, Mark, it's really, really lovely to be here. Thank you for asking me in. Great stuff. So let's start with some introductions. So if you could tell us maybe where you work and some of your research interests. Yeah, absolutely. So I'm Nicole Harris. I currently work at Portsmouth City Council as an educational psychologist. And I'm a visiting academic at the University of Southampton, which is where I studied to become an educational psychologist. Part of my role at the moment is I'm chief exec of a infrastructure charity. And we work with a lot of charity and community groups that are based around connectedness to well-being for young people. And I guess one of the things we hear quite a lot is how difficult, especially when trying to work with schools, it is to get on the curriculum, how pressured that curriculum space is. So I'd like a little bit of an elevator pitch. So if you've had some school head teachers, and you were trying to really sell the importance of nature connectedness and its impact on learning and behaviour, then how would you do that? Absolutely. And I think, in a way, that is the reason for the area that I did study, which was on the behaviours for learning, was to try and give another hook for headteachers. So I guess my elevator pitch would be that nature supports optimum development in so many ways. The more we look, the more we discover about how being in nature influences our physical and our mental health. And that this systematic literature review showed just how many different ways there are to support increased nature connectedness, which then also improves behaviours for learning. So in a nutshell, that having opportunities to connect with nature as being part of the national curriculum would help our young people connect with nature. It would be better for their well-being. It would be better for their ability to learn and engage with learning. And it would be better for the planet. So it's just win, win, win, really. Brilliant. Great pitch. And it feels intuitively right as part of my preparation for the podcast. I went for a walk. And being in nature just grounds us so much, I think. Yeah. Absolutely. So let's get into a little bit more detail. So what do we exactly mean by nature connectedness in the context of child and adolescent development? And why is it so important? So nature connectedness-- when we talk about nature connectedness, we're typically talking about a felt relationship with nature. And we see this as something different from time in nature, or the exposure to green space, which isn't to say that time and nature or exposure to green space aren't good in and of themselves. But when we're talking about nature connectedness, it's much more a felt relationship. And we can think about that with people as well. We can be in a shared space with people at home or in an open plan office and not necessarily feel that we have a relationship with them. So that's really where nature connectedness, I guess, differs as a construct. And I would say that with linking nature connectedness to behaviours for learning, I think this is quite a nascent area of research. And so starting to look into that, a lot of the research has tried to ground it in a couple of different psychological theories. So they've looked at attention restoration theory or Ulrich stress reduction theory, biophilia hypothesis from Wilson. And if we think that certain aspects of, say, behaviour for learning like attention could link quite logically to something like attention restoration theory, or the aspects of well-being could link quite well to stress reduction theory. If we're thinking about how it links to learning, we're opening up the door, I believe, a bit more on some of the unknowns that the core theories that we have been using, including nature connectedness, don't necessarily tap into all of the areas where we might see how it could influence behaviours for learning. So that's one of the avenues that Bee-- so one of the co-authors on the paper with me-- but Bee Hartwell and I are exploring whether if we look at it more from a neuroception and Stephen Porges' polyvagal theory. Whether that as an underpinning theory may speak slightly more to how nature connectedness does influence behaviours for learning. So could you unpack that a little bit? So mentioned the polyvagal theory. So some people might not be familiar with that, so. Yeah. Absolutely. And like I said, it's something that we are just starting to explore. So neuroception and polyvagal theory is very much about, it's our nervous system and our fight flight response. And the idea being that if we are in fight flight, if we're in a heightened state, we're not in a fit state to learn. Our body is in that runaway, stay safe, not the rest and digest, not the ability to be social, not the ability to engage with the prefrontal cortex, really. So it's almost bringing more aspects of nature and how that can allow us to attune with almost with our inner nature using the outer nature. And with that, downregulating our nervous system calming internally so that we can engage with learning. So like I said, that's currently what we are looking into to see whether that could be a better theory in which to ground how nature connectedness does influence behaviours for learning. So is there a sense that a disconnection with nature is aligned to maybe a disconnection with self and learning? Yeah. I think that is what we're definitely feeling our way into. I know we're almost starting with it with a tail end here because we haven't actually really spoken that much about what the paper found. But I think going at this from-- We've dived in, haven't we? We really, really have. Absolutely. So the systematic literature review was really dipping our toe in the water to see whether there was actually evidence that connecting children with nature could have an influence on behaviours for learning. And the short answer to that was yes, that there was a lot of evidence to show this. 68% of the papers found that the activities designed to increase nature connectedness in children and young people did increase nature connectedness. Interestingly, 77% of studies saw an impact on behaviours for learning. So we were seeing a positive impact on behaviours for learning even where we didn't necessarily see an impact on nature connectedness. So with that, and I guess myself quite naively going into the research at the outset-- and this feeds into the main theories underpinning a lot of nature connectedness research-- thought that I would see a lot of evidence from improved attention, improved engagement, that aspect of behaviours for learning. But if we consider that behaviours for learning exist across a broader spectrum, there's the cognitive aspect, absolutely. But there's also the social aspect. And there's the emotional aspect. And what a lot of the research that was coming back from the systematic literature review was really showing the main impact was actually on social skills. And then the second main impact, as it were, was on self-regulation. So really, really seeing an impact on areas that I wouldn't have necessarily have thought to look for. But this is very much what the papers were showing. And for me, what was super interesting with this as well was that a lot of the evidence was from qualitative studies. So it wasn't like they were stating what they were going out and looking for. They were just asking for feedback in terms of what was seen, which is why I think we do get such a broad range of behaviours for learning that have come back. Because I think if we had done it as a quantitative study and just asked for feedback on something like attention, , we possibly would have missed a huge amount of what the impact of these nature connectedness activities actually delivered to the young people. So starting it there at the tail end with the results of the systematic literature review where we were really seeing a huge impact on social skills and on self-regulation-- feeling that attention restoration theory, stress reduction theory, didn't necessarily hold all of what we were seeing. So it was trying to go back more generally to the literature, to our understanding of body and mind, all of this embodied learning and feeling that in this context something like polyvagal theory, where you are calming that nervous system response, where you are then in a frame of mind where you can engage socially, so what we're seeing with the improved social skills and where you have a better understanding and better control over your body. So the self-regulation skills may well explain the improvements on behaviour for learning that we're seeing. Fascinating. So I'm going to row us back a little bit because we have dived in. So could you just describe-- and we are building up that picture around what we mean. So what are some of those practical, low cost ways that group, schools can deliberately foster nature connectedness in children and young people? Yeah. Absolutely. And this is what, again, was really interesting about the systematic literature review. It was just the huge variety of activities that schools were delivering. So if I start by saying, in a way, the purpose of the literature review at the outset was to try and find what schools were actually delivering on school sites. So this really would have been a useful guide for what schools could reasonably replicate. But there was very little in the literature in terms of activities that had been carried out on school sites. So it was broadened out that little bit to include any educational setting. And then with that, it had to be activities where one of the markers, the data that they were seeking to collect was actually on nature connectedness. So again, it's not to say that there are other schools and centres carrying out a wider range of activities. But one of the keys from our point of view was to look whether they were collecting data on nature connectedness and on behaviours for learning. So that being said, there was a huge variety of different activities. So some young people were taken surfing on the South Coast of England. Some young people were hiking in Scotland. There were some taking place in Southern Africa. But if we look at the activities that were very implementable on a school site, we saw a lot of things like playing in nature. We saw things like getting your hands dirty, literally getting your hands dirty, connecting with the microbiome, with the dirt and the leaves, and bits and pieces like that. There were art-based activities, so doing things like sunlight photography. There was another one in Canada again about using-- so as opposed to sunlight photography, we are using the sun to take pictures, using actual cameras to take pictures of nature. That elicited an emotional connection with you. But a lot of it was about going out and trying to build a connection. And sometimes that's just starting with as simply as laying in the grass and paying attention to what you can see, paying attention to what you can hear, just being present in that moment, being mindful in that moment, and trying to build that connection. So what I was saying, a huge range of activities. There was art-based ones where you're working with nature to create art installations. There was things like songwriting in nature. There were things like playing in nature. There were a whole spectrum of activities that didn't necessarily involve-- and this is what we were really, really keen to show. It didn't necessarily involve being in deepest, darkest, wild nature, rainforests of Western Canada, as you will. These schools were using bits of nature that were accessible to them either on their school site-- some schools clearly have access to much better green space than others. But even the ones where there was a lot of tarmacked yard, they could build raised beds. Some of them were digging up bits of their yard so that they could put in a pond. Some of them were managing bits of woodland that they hadn't thought to use before. So it was almost bits of the school ground that had been fenced off that they're now creating access to, or there were schools that had allotments next door or would have a churchyard next door. So a huge range of activities, a huge range of opportunities, and opportunities for schools to be creative in their local environments. So what are some of the challenges that schools face in trying to develop those opportunities? So my research didn't necessarily look at that. But I know there is research recently done by, I think, [? Amy ?] [? Patchen, ?] who very much did look at what are some of the barriers to outdoor education in young people. And I think what they found were, I guess in many ways, the not surprising things. The time-- literally having time in the day. The curriculum pressures-- schools are under such pressure to deliver. There were things like the risk, health and safety. We're taking children outside. Oh, my goodness, they might get wet or muddy or dirty. But there are realities with that. There can be stings. There can be sunburn-- things like that. But I would argue, probably not necessarily much more than what most children would be exposed to when they're out playing at lunchtime or break anyway. But I think what was interesting, what she found was one of the key takeaways is that it's not necessarily the individual barriers in a school that are the problem. It's the overlapping of the barriers. So it can be quite easy to unpick them one at a time. So it can be quite easy, for instance, to find time in the day for one class to go outside. But how do you find time across the week for all classes in a school to go outside? Because of course I get time-- like, say lunchtime, everyone is out at the same time. And you're not managing that experience in quite the same way as you might be able to do if you go out as a single class. So if you do have a small woodland area where you'd like to do some specific activities in, how are you literally timetabling that across the day, across the week so that everyone has equitable access to that? Yeah. So I think that was the key takeaway, I think, from her paper that you have to do a systems approach to it. That it's not necessarily an easy solve that you need to simultaneously be looking at all of the barriers and looking to resolve them almost simultaneously. But there's no reason why it's not doable. These things are hard until they're done, and then I think they're done. And I think the other takeaway was that the barriers are quite often school specific. Some of them, of course, will overlap like the curriculum demands. But some of them are more specific to the schools. I guess there's an inequality aspect to this in terms of people from more deprived areas-- have less access to green space. So it feels like there needs to be some work in that policy and practise implementation space. We're going to think about it from that perspective, too. Yeah. 100%. And I think the research shows that children and young people from more deprived areas have 9% less access to green spaces. And that's one of the main areas where we'd really love to see opportunities to connect with nature as being part of the school curriculum. It makes it equitable for all children and young people. And in that way, you're then trying to centralise a green space, a green ability to connect, making it something that all children and young people can benefit from. There's really strong evidence that shows that there's a link between being connected to nature as a child that follows through. You then remain an adult who has strong nature connectedness. So typically, we would then see that that works the other way around as well, isn't it? That nature connectedness is something that parents can pass on to their children. But if that isn't actually happening, if that is what has been broken, then to reverse that cycle we do need to start developing that sense of nature connectedness in young children so that they do grow up to be adults who are connected to nature, who then pass that on to their children to build that back into our way of being. Yeah. We've just had the psychiatric morbidity survey released in June. And it really talks about the rising tide of mental health problems, particularly in girls. So I just wondered, was there anything in a systematic review which picked up on that gender aspect? So nothing that I picked up in this paper. I have written another paper which looked at how well-being decreases from primary school as you head into secondary school and through secondary school, how nature connectedness also decreases through primary school into secondary school. So there seems to be a bit of a pivot point around the age of 11 at which nature connectedness starts to change. There's a lot of evidence that shows that being strongly connected to nature is actually linked to positive being. So there's been quite a few studies, especially in adults, promoting nature connectedness as a way of improving well-being. So again, in terms of my research looking to improve nature connectedness in young people as a way to conceivably offset that decrease in being, as you then ride through the bumpy, low well-being period of secondary school before you come out the other side. So there would be-- which is another really, really strong argument of trying to get nature connectedness programmes into primary school so that we're getting that nature connectedness as high as we can as early as we can. That we're then buffering, hopefully, declines in well-being going into secondary school. And tying back to what you were saying about difference in ages, I think what the papers that I was looking at showed was that girls quite often have lower well-being going through secondary school. But interestingly, boys have lower nature connectedness. So in a weird way, you have the potential to benefit both boys and girls from almost different points of view, and that you can be using increasing nature connectedness to shore up the being of girls. But equally, you can also use the programmes to increase the nature connectedness of boys, which has historically been lower than girls. So it does have potential impacts to have great positive impacts on both in slightly different ways. And I'm also interested in that special educational needs perspective. Was there anything in the systematic review that picked up on their particular needs? So not so much. Although I know there have been other papers that have picked up on it a little bit. I don't think there's been a huge amount of research. I think I was reading from someone that there isn't a huge amount of research into nature connectedness in children with special educational needs and disabilities. I guess I would have a wonder around that. And within educational psychology, we quite often try and push back that little bit in that saying that, good teaching benefits all learners. In a way, in adopting an inclusive practise, why would we segregate? And in this way, I would equally say that the opportunity to connect with nature benefits all learners. So would we want to focus on one particular group? I would also bring to that that as an educational psychologist, right now so many of the schools and so many of the young people that I'm being asked to work with have difficulties with emotional regulation. We were seeing a lot of really, really dysregulated children in schools. And we're now labelling them almost as special educational needs and disability to ensure that they get the support that they need. But is this strictly speaking an educational need or a disability? Or are these children that really just need support to connect with themselves to be able to emotionally regulate and to feel better in and of themselves? So I guess that's a really long way around of saying that I imagine there probably are benefits to it. And that is, again, with Bee Hartwell, a thesis that we're supervising right now where [? Imogen ?] Grey is working with five different schools. And she is looking at small groups of children who do struggle with emotional regulation to see more specifically how it may impact on them. So I don't have a direct answer to that. It is something that we are working on. Extendind this a little bit, feeding back to what you were saying about barriers to introducing nature connectedness activities in schools, I know that-- I think it was [? Amy ?] [? Patchen-- ?] again, her research showed that actually sometimes teachers almost take their children out less frequently to ensure equitable access to the outdoors. And because quite often children with special educational needs and disabilities are withdrawn from classes for specialist intervention, that this is another one of the systemic barriers that if your children are out of class quite regularly, they may will actually be missing out on it. So some teachers are making the choice of not going out so that none of the children miss out, if that makes sense. So again, it's something systemically that schools would need to look at as to-- if the class was going outside, to make sure that none of the interventions were taking place in that time to ensure that actually everyone could go out. Yeah. It sounds like it has the potential to be really an inclusive part of the curriculum that actually benefits everyone in potentially different ways. And I think with this-- and this is what I've seen, I guess, anecdotally-- is that when I used to work in a secondary school, when we took the kids out who did struggle with being in a class, who did struggle with sitting still, who did struggle with attention and impulsivity-- and you took them outside where they were allowed to be. The skills that those children displayed was huge. They came into their own-- and things like their leadership ability, or their organisational skills, or their enthusiasm. Yeah, it lets children shine in a way that maybe they can't always do in class. And that in terms of self-esteem is a huge motivator. You mentioned earlier a little bit about the climate crisis. And so I'm just wondering about the connection to ecological anxiety. I think we see that as part of the mixture of mental health and well-being concerns that young people have. So is there a connection between-- or is there an opportunity around nature connectedness and that eco-anxiety? Yeah, I believe so. I mean, I think there's two elements to that. And it is, I think, necessary to acknowledge that feeling connected to nature may make you more prone to eco-anxiety and climate anxiety. This is hardly surprising. If you feel strongly connected to something and you see it being abused and not cared for, that really can elicit feelings of depression, and anxiety, and unhappiness. So 100% there is the potential for that correlation. On a more positive note, there is a lot of evidence in the literature that shows that increasing nature connectedness increases pro-environmental behaviours. So you're more likely to get people acting in a way that is planet kind, is looking after the planetary well-being. So increasing nature connectedness, hopefully, in the long run will have a more positive impact. And I think there's the idea, too, as well that with opportunities to come together and that sense of collective agency and collective action where you have children who then maybe do feel part of a group, where you are working together to promote change, that you might get that little bit of hope that comes from that. Coming together as a class to connect with nature, you're connecting with potentially other like minded children. You're no longer feeling so alone. You are getting more of that, hopefully, collective action, which is building sense of agency, which is then hopefully building sense of hope. I think a lot of young people as well feel particularly despondent because there's a sense that adults aren't doing anything. So if you get schools who are facilitating this, maybe there is that bit of a sense of some people are trying to do something. And there's also the potential for it being a space that you can share how you are feeling so that, again, you're not feeling alone in that despondency. That you are with adults and peers who can maybe help you hold those feelings, express those feelings, and work through them and work with it. So I think it's a complex one in that it has the potential to increase feelings of eco-anxiety and despondency. But equally, it can also flip that and make more people more climate aware, engage in more pro-environmental behaviours, and to carry that through then into adulthood-- that is something that then sticks. Yeah, so something that has to be really carefully managed-- the potential for it to raise anxieties as you feel more connected, but also, the opportunity for it to make you feel a little bit more powerful, that you can change things at that local level [AUDIO OUT] with peers [AUDIO OUT]. It would be really useful just to broaden this out a little bit. So I'm just wondering what role nature connectedness could play in a wider strategic context, and particularly mindful around the epidemic in mental health concerns we've got at the moment in young people. So I think in terms of supporting well-being, like I said, there's a huge evidence base around how initiatives to increase nature connectedness in adults supports adult well-being. And there's a growing evidence base in children and young people showing something similar. So again, this is coming back when we're talking about the underpinning theories. I think we're looking at it quite often from stress reduction theory. We're also looking at it from biophilia hypothesis that we very much evolved as part of nature. There's an attitude right now where we're talking about nature disconnection. But the truth is we are a part of nature. Nature connectedness isn't a new thing. The element that's new is the disconnection from nature. And like we were talking about earlier, the disconnection from ourself as well. So Bee and I refer to our inner nature as well as our outer nature. I think programmes or initiatives that really support us-- there is almost just engaging with ourselves, like the who we are, who we evolved to be, how we evolved to be. We have been modern humanity for a very, very small dot of time, if we think of evolution of humanity in the longer term. So coming back in a way to policy and the rest of that, if we have to make it a policy to reconnect with, I guess, in a way, how we're meant to be or who we're meant to be, or things that work well for us. It is almost like we have just forgotten what is regulating for us. And we did grow up outside, as it were, if we think about that. So it's hardly surprising. Mark, you said, preparing for this, you went for a walk outside. And I imagine it probably helped calm you down a little bit, tamed the squirrely thoughts a little bit, and it does. I think we all have this-- we talk quite often about evidence-based practise. And we can flip that to practise-based evidence, when we pay attention to how certain things make us feel. And I think nature connectedness is one of those things. So if we do have to start putting it into policy-- and that's where I would love to see it to sit, that it does become part of school policy for opportunities to engage outside with nature in a way that promotes nature connectedness. And we have this multitude of benefits. We're getting children outside. We're getting them connecting with nature. We're getting them active. We're getting them connecting with themselves. We've got the knock on benefits of improved being, of improved physical health. And as that final carrot for schools to make room for it in their curriculum, it makes them better learners because their nervous system is regulated. They can actually engage with learning. And they might then hopefully have that motivation to engage with learning as well. Brilliant. We haven't mentioned technology up to now. I just wondered whether-- because it feels like spending time in nature could also be part of an antidote around getting off screen time as well. And I wonder whether the research explored that at all. I don't know that I can speak to that directly, because I think quite often we get conflicting evidence from the effects of social media, isn't it? There's times where it can be positive and encourage a sense of belonging. And then there equally, there can be times where there's negative aspects that we see to it. So I think, absolutely, children and young people are spending much more time inside these days. They're spending much more time online these days. But I also think we need to tread carefully about vilifying technology completely because I think it sometimes is one of those things that we do have to work with. So I know that there are, for instance, apps that you can get on phones which are about getting children and young people outside and engaging with nature. And in that case, if that's the element that gets them outside and engaging in some way, I would see that as a positive first step and hopefully, leading to then, at some stage, leaving the phones behind. But equally, we're seeing taking pictures of nature can be a really strong way of supporting nature connectedness. And most of us would be taking pictures on our phone right now. So that is using technology as a way of engaging. I know for me, one of the ways that I stay connected with my family in Canada is taking pictures of nature and sending them back and forth. And so I wouldn't want to say categorically all technology bad. Will I say that, yes, children are inside much more? Yes. Are they on gadgets much more? Yes. And this has been building for a really, really long time. And I think this is where Richard Louv and the idea of nature disconnectedness has first come in, that kids aren't out roaming anymore and playing the unsupervised play. And there's many reasons for this. So, yeah. Look, we're coming to the towards the end of the podcast. So I'm really interested to know whether you've got any future research in the field, or whether you're aware of any other kind of studies that are exploring some of the issues we've touched on today. Yeah. So we are currently supervising a PhD research right now which is looking at exploring from neuroreception and Porges' polyvagal lens to see whether that's a way of understanding the impacts that we're seeing. We've also developed a scale which is looking at measuring what we've called the sense of self, how self-regulated or how self-aware a young person feels after engaging with nature connectedness activities. There's a lot of research going on right now in the field of nature connectedness, which is super, super exciting and super interesting to see. And from different angles-- so we're very much looking at it from the perspective of being educational psychologists and what we can do in schools to help support this from that lens of supporting children engage with learning-- be the best that they can be. Yeah, so I think if it is an area that people are interested in, nature connectedness is definitely a very lively field at the minute right now. And there's lots of really interesting and really powerful research being carried out. Yeah, amazing. Is there anything that you wanted to share with our listeners that we haven't covered? I guess my main takeaway would be for us to move beyond the idea of us not being nature. We are nature. It's been, I guess, a very Western view to other things other than humanity to put us at the top of all of the trees and to start seeing ourselves as part of that wider world, really, and how important that is, actually, that it's not just really a nice thing to think about. But for our continued existence, for planetary well-being, we really do have to see ourselves as a cog in the wheel as opposed to the driver of the bus in this. That we need to be more consciously present. We need to value our connection with nature and look after. And through that, we're looking after both planetary nature and ourselves. Nicole, it's been such a fascinating discussion. Thank you so much for your time. It's been really rich conversation. So thank you very much. I hope, listeners, that you've enjoyed the podcast. If you enjoyed the podcast, then please leave a rating and a review. Thank you very much. Thanks so much, Mark. [MUSIC PLAYING]