Walking has benefits besides keeping us from becoming tubby. Research consistently shows that taking a stroll has positive psychological implications, as well. Designing opportunities to walk, inside and outside, into a workplace, via planned inconveniences or tempting circulation routes, for example, can have real and immediate positive outcomes.
Walking, both indoors and outside, has been linked to more creative thinking by rigorous scientific studies. Throughout history, people seeking creative insights have reported having just the sort of inspirations they sought while walking. Research indicates that walking can boost creative thinking for all of us; its benefits are not reserved for a select few who have been officially designated as “creative.” Walking can also put us in a better mood and help us feel less stressed.
In a 2017 issue of American Psychologist, Webb, Rossignac-Milan and Higgins synthesize research related to the psychological implications of taking a stroll. Their work indicates that taking a walk with someone may make it easier for us to get along with that other person, as well as promoting cooperation and the resolution of disagreements with them. So, those tempting circulation routes need to be wide enough for walking groups to travel past each other comfortably.
Walking outside or with a view outdoors has the added benefit of helping us restock our mental processing power after our cognitive energy banks have been depleted by doing work that requires us to focus – if what we’re looking at is effortlessly fascinating to us. Seeing landscapes similar to well-tended meadows is effortlessly fascinating, as is looking at water/aquariums or fire, for example. So is viewing some carefully designed urban vistas – and they’re much more likely to be a positive office area addition than something on fire.
The research is clear – walking has psychological and social benefits, as well as health ones. Amble-enabled workplaces should be developed whenever possible.
Sally Augustin, PhD, a cognitive scientist, is the editor of Research Design Connections (www.researchdesignconnections.com), a monthly subscription newsletter and free daily blog, where recent and classic research in the social, design, and physical sciences that can inform designers’ work are presented in straightforward language. Readers learn about the latest research findings immediately, before they’re available elsewhere. Sally, who is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, is also the author of Place Advantage: Applied Psychology for Interior Architecture (Wiley, 2009) and, with Cindy Coleman, The Designer’s Guide to Doing Research: Applying Knowledge to Inform Design (Wiley, 2012). She is a principal at Design With Science (www.designwithscience.com) and can be reached at sallyaugustin@designwithscience.com.