Efeitos da Presença de Áreas Verdes para a Melhoria do Desempenho Acadêmico

Abstract

The presence of natural environments contributes to improving people's quality of life in different aspects, as mood, anxiety and stress, thus contributing directly to their mental health. In the academic setting, there has been a visible decline in mental health, especially among young students. The presence of green areas in university campuses would not only support improved mental health but could eventually improve the academic performance of students. Therefore, this study analyzed whether the presence and use of equatorial natural or simulated green areas influence the improvement of academic performance of undergraduates and their perception of stress and difficulty level associated to tests. For that, two experiments were performed, one in the afternoon and one in the evening, both carried out with undergraduate students at a Brazilian public university. In both experiments, for each group (corresponding to a specific class), on a test day, half of the students were drawn to be in the control group, remaining in the classroom in the minutes preceding the test. In the afternoon shift, the other half of the students were invited to walk on an ecological trail of an urban fragment of the Atlantic Forest for 10 minutes in silence and without contact with electronic devices, before the test. In the evening shift, the students participating in the experiment individually watched a video that simulates a walk on a natural trail with ambient sound, in a dimly place. A total of 355 students from different majors participated in the experiment, of which 258 in the afternoon (96 in the Natural experiment group - N and 162 in the Natural Control group - CN), and 97 in the evening (45 Simulated Experiment - S and 52 Simulated Control - CS). After taking the tests, students answered questions on a Likert Scale about: 1) how difficult they thought the test was, 2) whether they could concentrate during the test, 3) whether they felt the need to check their cell phone, and, for those who were not in the Control groups, 4) whether they liked the Experiment and 5) would like to join it again in the future. The analyses showed that the students participating in the Simulated Experiment had statistically higher grades in the tests than the Control groups (Student's t-test; p <0.05), in addition to showing greater satisfaction responses in the questions measured on the Likert Scale. On the other hand, a PCA analysis indicated a tendency for better general academic performance of students who participated in the experiments (natural or simulated), in addition to a more positive perception about the degree of difficulty of the test and ease of concentration. Despite the beneficial effects of both experiments, future studies should understand the better performance of those subject to simulated environments, as a way of isolating the effect of an eventual higher concentration during the simulated experience or of physical discomfort (thermal and caused by insects) in a natural environment.