Living in areas with plenty of greenery — near parks and trees — helps improve concentration and attention in children, the website infohub.kz reports.
Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis analyzed data on nearly 12,000 American children aged nine and ten. They matched the children's home addresses against satellite maps of green space and information on urban parks. The participants then completed a series of tests measuring memory, rule-switching, information-processing speed and the ability to ignore distractions.
The study found that a 10 percentage point increase in green space in a child's neighborhood produced a small gain in attention scores. According to the researchers, natural surroundings gently occupy a child's thoughts without overloading the brain as sharply as gadget screens or street noise do. This allows the resources of voluntary attention to recover. A sense of safety also proved important: green surroundings help focus only when a child feels safe outdoors.
The scientists partly attributed the link to cleaner air in green neighborhoods with lower levels of fine harmful particles. After adjusting for family income, however, the connection between greenery and scores on reading and vocabulary tests was no longer statistically significant, although the effect of parks on attention remained. The authors believe that planting greenery in schoolyards and residential areas could become an accessible tool for supporting children's cognitive development.