BLOGPOST BY CARMEN GARCIA SANCHEZ / DATE 14.09.2023
Aarhus University campus garden by C.T.Sørensen (Denmark) © PhD Carmen García Sánchez
"Nature remains our magic well: the more we draw from its nourishing waters, the more we sustain the human body, mind, and spirit" Professor Emeritus of Social Ecology Stephen R. Kellert
Our own biophilic response depends on our previous experience. We can restore the balance to nature by changing the way we educate ourselves, raise our children, use land and resources, develop building and community design, practice our ethics, and conduct our everyday lives. The inborn affinity for the natural world must be learned to become fully functional, it must be cultivated and earned.
This means that the more we train ourselves to enjoy nature, the more we will be able to benefit from it, because the desire to connect to a place and the natural environment is related to our personal memories.
Biophilic design strategies will differ depending on the local political climate, zoning, geography, land availability. While empirical research has evidenced that there is a degree of universality to landscape preferences among humans (which has an impact on biophilic response trends), preferences have been modified by cultural influences, previous experiences, socio-economic, gender and age factors. Therefore, achieving an effective biophilic design is a very complex task.
It has received funding from the European
Union’s H2020 research and innovation
programme under the MSCA grant
agreement 896651. The present action
reflects only the author’s view and it does
not engage in any way the views of the
European Commission