This study examined how natural elements and sunlight exposure in workspaces influence employee mental health and job attitudes. Both natural elements and sunlight exposure influenced employee mental health and job attitudes. Natural elements and sunlight exposure simultaneously explained more variance in job attitudes than mental health outcomes.
Exposure to natural elements is associated with decreased levels of diastolic blood pressure, depression, and anxiety, and increased attentional capacity. Exposure to natural elements (e.g., green spaces) can reduce the impact of stress, increase psychological well-being, and support recovery from illness. Compared to people exposed to urban views, those exposed to views of nature discount the future less. That is, they place a greater value on the future, which has consequently been associated with a healthier lifestyle.
Sunlight had a more powerful effect than natural elements. It had considerably stronger effects on mental health outcomes, with indirect sunlight associated with about twice as much of the explained variance in depression as natural elements exposure. We found that greater levels of natural elements exposure were associated with lower depressed mood and higher job satisfaction and organizational commitment. We also found that the relationship between natural elements exposure and job satisfaction is mediated by depressed mood (Hypothesis 2). This is a unique and potentially important finding. First, this finding suggests that natural elements exposure influences mood and that mood in turn influences job satisfaction. Few studies in organizational psychology have explicitly examined the relationship between depressed mood and job satisfaction, although many typically include both constructs as dependent variables.
Analysis
This study goes into a very detailed outline of how nature helps the workplace. The focus is on sunlight, natural elements, and plants and how they relate to moods. The final findings, while explained thoroughly throughout the study, explain what specific things, whether that is sunlight or natural elements and plants, can help with different mental health concerns. This study investigated the effects of natural elements, direct sunlight, and indirect sunlight exposure on employee mental health and work attitudes. Natural elements and sunlight exposure related to positive job satisfaction. Direct sunlight helped with anxiety while indirect sunlight helped overall with depressed moods, job satisfaction and work productivity. Even natural elements helped employees with depressed moods and anxiety. While this was a very wordy study, the overall idea is important because the location of our space is outside. This study can help with designing things like shaded areas, single person spaces, and multi-person spaces. Sunlight and nature are important things for people because it can improve your mood and work ethic.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0155614&mod=article_inline
