Employees now are more pressured than ever before. Because of this, employers and businesses are experimenting with a variety of calming activities for their employees, ranging from morning meditation sessions to video games in the break room. A new study has discovered an endearingly easy solution. Small potted plants around the office, according to researchers from Japan’s University of Hyogo, can help relieve employee tension.
It has long been established that spending time outdoors and in nature is beneficial to one’s general mental health. An office job, of course, makes it impossible for the average person to receive enough green vistas. As a result, the research team wanted to see how useful indoor plants may be for employees who are stuck indoors all day.
The study’s authors conducted their experiment in a real-life office setting with real employees, rather of a more scientifically typical lab setup, to get as accurate results as possible. Researchers sought to see how much comfort workers felt after glancing at an indoor plant whenever they became fatigued on the job. However, passive interaction with the plants was also considered.
Few people properly comprehend and utilize the stress-relieving benefits of plants in the workplace. To alleviate such conditions, research author Masahiro Toyoda believed it was vital to validate and give scientific proof for the stress restorative impact of adjacent plants in a genuine office scenario.
Workers’ psychological and physiological stress levels were measured before and after a small plant was placed on each of their desks. In total, 63 Japanese office workers participated in the study, and they were all told to take a three-minute break if they felt unusually tired or fatigued on the job.
The experiment had two parts: A control period when people worked regularly without any plants in the office, and an experimental period where each employee was given a plant for their desk and told to keep it healthy. The psychological stress levels of employees were then measured using a standard test. After taking a three-minute break and interacting with their desk plant, most employees showed much lower pulse rates, indicating a notable reduction in stress levels.
Researchers divided employee interactions with their plants into two categories: Active (caring for their desk plant, intentionally looking at / interacting with it whenever they were stressed) and passive (not caring for their desk plant, but looking at / interacting with it whenever they were stressed) (simply having the plant near their computer monitor throughout the work day). The authors discovered that simply looking at a plant can assist to relax an employee.
Each participant could choose from six different types of plants to put on their desks: san pedro cactus, foliage plants, kokedama, echeveria, air plants, or bonsai plants.
Overall, when the plants were introduced into the office, employees’ anxiety levels decreased significantly. These results were consistent across all age groups, and it didn’t seem to matter which type of employee was on their desk.
So, if you are finding that every day at work is demanding on your mind, pay a visit to your local nursery. A small plant pal could be exactly what the doctor ordered.
The research was published in HortTechnology, a scientific journal published by the American Society for Horticultural Science (click here).
