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Volume 19
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10.3390/ijerph19116672
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Article

Effect of Indoor Forest Bathing on Reducing Feelings of Fatigue Using Cerebral Activity as an Indicator

by
Chie Imamura
1,*,
Kiyomi Sakakibara
1,
Kyosuke Arai
2,
Hideki Ohira
3,
Yuhei Yamaguchi
2 and
Hitoshi Yamada
2
1
Toyota Central R&D Labs., Inc., Nagakute 480-1192, Japan
2
Frontier Research Center, Toyota Motor Corporation, Toyota 471-8572, Japan
3
Department of Psychology, Nagoya University, Nagoya 464-8601, Japan
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(11), 6672; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19116672
Submission received: 24 March 2022 / Revised: 23 May 2022 / Accepted: 25 May 2022 / Published: 30 May 2022
(This article belongs to the Section Health-Related Quality of Life and Well-Being)
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Abstract

We created an indoor forest bathing environment in a sunlight-type environmentally controlled chamber and both physiological and psychological measurements were conducted for the evaluation of mental fatigue reduction. At first, a working memory load experiment was performed among 10 participants in a space without plants to identify an indicator correlating with feelings of fatigue, using the cerebral activity of the prefrontal cortex. Then, the indicator was used to evaluate whether a 20-min exposure to an indoor forest bathing environment reduced the level of the feeling of fatigue. The working memory load experiment demonstrated that, when mental fatigue increased, the amount of oxygenated hemoglobin (oxy-Hb) in the right prefrontal cortex and the right-left difference in oxy-Hb (ΔRL oxy-Hb) in the prefrontal cortex increased. These were proposed as indicators of mental fatigue. In the indoor forest bathing experiment, staying in an indoor green space showed that the subjective values of feeling of fatigue decreased and ΔRL oxy-Hb decreased. Since these results demonstrated an opposite effect to the increase in ΔRL oxy-Hb related to the feeling of fatigue, it was inferred that the decrease in ΔRL oxy-Hb reflected the fatigue reduction in the indoor forest bathing environment.
Keywords: indoor forest bathing; biophilic; brain activity; near-infrared spectroscopy; prefrontal cortex activity; reduction of feeling of fatigue indoor forest bathing; biophilic; brain activity; near-infrared spectroscopy; prefrontal cortex activity; reduction of feeling of fatigue

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MDPI and ACS Style

Imamura, C.; Sakakibara, K.; Arai, K.; Ohira, H.; Yamaguchi, Y.; Yamada, H. Effect of Indoor Forest Bathing on Reducing Feelings of Fatigue Using Cerebral Activity as an Indicator. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19, 6672. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19116672

AMA Style

Imamura C, Sakakibara K, Arai K, Ohira H, Yamaguchi Y, Yamada H. Effect of Indoor Forest Bathing on Reducing Feelings of Fatigue Using Cerebral Activity as an Indicator. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2022; 19(11):6672. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19116672

Chicago/Turabian Style

Imamura, Chie, Kiyomi Sakakibara, Kyosuke Arai, Hideki Ohira, Yuhei Yamaguchi, and Hitoshi Yamada. 2022. "Effect of Indoor Forest Bathing on Reducing Feelings of Fatigue Using Cerebral Activity as an Indicator" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 19, no. 11: 6672. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19116672

APA Style

Imamura, C., Sakakibara, K., Arai, K., Ohira, H., Yamaguchi, Y., & Yamada, H. (2022). Effect of Indoor Forest Bathing on Reducing Feelings of Fatigue Using Cerebral Activity as an Indicator. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(11), 6672. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19116672

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