For Just 2 Hours a Week, There's a Simple Practice That Could Make You Healthier
               
Over the years, it's become increasingly clear that spending time in nature is somehow linked to healthier and happier lives.

But while some physicians have literally started 'prescribing' doses of the natural world, like they would exercise, such practices are far from established.

Researchers in the United Kingdom have now taken a small but important step towards one of the most crucial, unanswered questions: how much time outdoors is enough?

Drawing on a nationwide survey of nearly 20,000 British adults from 2014 to 2016, the team thinks they might have found a weekly 'sweet spot' for nature exposure.

"Compared to no nature contact last week, the likelihood of reporting good health or high well-being became significantly greater with contact≥120 mins," the authors conclude.

The findings are supported by past research, which has found that living in greener areas is associated with lower risks of cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, asthma emergencies, mental distress, mortality and even myopia in children. Some have even landed on this 120 minute threshold before.

Nevertheless, these results are still in their infancy, and it remains unclear how much exposure we humans truly need to reap the benefits.

Exploring this idea further, participants in the most recent study were asked how much nature they had experienced in the last seven days.

Randomly selecting just one of these "nature diary entries", the interviewer then asked for more details, including how long the visit was, who they went with, how they got there, and what they got up to.

Bringing together these responses, the authors found that individuals who spent less than two hours in nature across the week - including visits to woodlands, beaches and parks - reported similar health and well-being to those who experienced no nature whatsoever.