Social benefits

Health & wellbeing

It is a proven fact that trees improve the mental and physical wellbeing of human beings.  The presence of trees in parks and other green spaces encourages people to use these green spaces more often and therefore become more active and physically fit.  Research has also proven that, within three minutes of being in green, leafy surroundings human stress levels are significantly reduced.  Hospital patients recovering from major surgical operations who had views of trees from their hospital beds were seen to recover more quickly and need less medication than those who had views of barren landscapes without trees.

Greater community cohesion

Trees help define urban areas, creating a sense of place.  This can help to foster a greater sense of pride and respect for an area. Trees encourage people out of their homes and into public open space, where people interact more with others and build stronger social relationships.  The process of tree planting also brings people together and empowers communities, which can often stimulate further community action in other areas.

Employee performance

Recent research in both the United States and Europe has found that desk workers who can see nature from their desks tend to experience less time off sick (up to 23% less in one study) than those who can not see any nature. Desk workers who can see nature also report greater job satisfaction (reported by Wolf, 1998(d)) and their performance whilst at work was also of a higher standard than those with no views of nature.

Crime reduction

The conventional wisdom has been that trees and other vegetation have a negative impact on crime because they provide cover for criminals and reduce opportunities for casual surveillance.

Research in a particularly deprived area of inner city Chicago has suggested that this is in fact not the case and that appropriate vegetation cover can lead to reduced crime rates (Kuo and Sullivan, 2001(a)). The study dealt largely with mown grass and high canopy trees, which do not provide cover in the same way as, for example, shrub planting. It looked at an area with relatively homogenous architecture and a relatively homogenous population but with differing levels of vegetation. Areas with higher vegetation cover were found to have lower rates of crime, as measured by reports to the police.

Two reasons are suggested as to why crime rates might be reduced by trees. The first is through an increase in surveillance, because public open space with trees tends to be used much more than space without trees.  The second reason relates particularly to violent crime and relates to evidence that vegetation has a mitigating effect on mental fatigue, which often is a precursor to outbursts of anger and violence (Kuo and Sullivan, 2001(b)).