Landscape and Human Health Laboratory

The Landscape and Human Health Laboratory (LHHL) is committed to using an interdisciplinary approach to solve problems linked to human nature and the physical environment.

The LHHL uses its findings to promote policies to:
• Increase the use of and care for green landscaping to help individuals, families, and communities flourish
• Suggest locations for green landscaping where the environment is most challenging and relief is most needed
• Aid in the design of green landscapes so that they are as effective in promoting human health as possible

LHHL examines the impacts of natural features—trees, grass, flowers, and green spaces—on:
• Safety, crime, violence, and aggression
• Strength of community
• Well-being, coping, and vitality
• Attention, executive-functions, self-control, learning

They study underserved groups, such as:
• Elderly adults
• Impoverished, inner-city adults and children
• Children with and without Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

In 2006, Dr. Frances Kuo founded the LHHL to focus on this relationship between human health and greenspace. Dr. Kuo has advanced degrees in both cognitive and environmental psychology and attempts to involve researchers from different disciplines in every research project. Dr. Andrea Faber Taylor, a member of LHHL, is recognized internationally for her research on the health benefits of green spaces for children. Her research evaluates the relationships between children’s exposure to green space and their functioning to discover how to design spaces and communities to be more supportive of healthy development. Her diverse published findings include such benefits to children as more creative play, greater concentration, and greater self-discipline. Those findings, along with her groundbreaking research on the benefits of nature in children with ADHD, have resulted in extensive coverage in the media.