NATURE AND THE MIND

A densely detailed account of a promising new science.

The establishment of a new field of scientific inquiry is a noteworthy occurrence, especially when it holds the potential to benefit the entire human population. Such is Berman’s ongoing achievement in “environmental neuroscience,” a drive to understand the relationship between individuals and the environmental factors that influence them, specifically the natural and urban worlds. Berman, a professor of psychology at the University of Chicago and an engineer, demonstrates the ways in which our physical environment has a profound impact on our behavior and our brain development. “In study after study, we find that even secondhand or simulated contact with nature helps our cognitive, physical, and social health,” Berman writes. But immersion is best, whether in city parks or the wilderness. On the surface, this overarching theme seems like something John Muir could have set forth in a paragraph. But the subject is a great deal more complex, the issues urgent, and the proposed solutions requiring global engagement. Berman’s is a singularly significant book that is both fascinating and taxing. Although leavened with personal anecdotes, it reads at times like an unending stream of scientific studies related in numbing detail, intentionally but needlessly repetitive, and too often constructed with paragraphs so long it makes you wish you were in nature, escaping the page. If intended primarily for a professional audience, all well and good. It’s brilliant and persuasive. If aimed at the intelligent general reader, it is something less than an unqualified success—which is not to say that it lacks clarity or an unshakable logic. Berman also projects what the future may hold in the field, while discussing how its discoveries can help us design better environments today.

Humanity and its environments are even more interconnected than we knew.