Human brain hard-wired for rural tranquillity
Source: dailymail.co.uk
Human brains are hard-wired to enjoy the calm of the countryside – while cities make us confused, anxious and aggressive
Many of us dream of escaping to the calm and tranquillity of the countryside, leaving the rat race behind - and it seems this may be due to the fact our brain is telling us to.
Researchers from Exeter have discovered we are hard-wired to seek out rural landscapes because they make us feel calm, while cities confuse us and make us aggressive - even if we’ve only ever lived in urban areas.
This could be due to the fact humans lived in rural environments for hundreds of years, or may be because our brains just aren’t equipped to handle the huge amounts of stimuli in busy cityscapes.
To test their theory of rural versus urban living, scientists at Exeter University wired up participants to an MRI scanner before showing them images of cities and country landscapes.
When rural images were flashed onto a screen, the limbic area of the brain was activated and lit up on the scanner.
This area is associated with feelings of calm and peacefulness and is part of the brain shared with monkeys and primates.
However, when images of cities and busy streets were shown to the participants, the area of the brain associated with ‘visual complexity’ - the visual cortex in the occipital lobe - was activated.
This caused the brain to try and scan the image, make sense of everything it was seeing and process all the information, which can lead to confusion and anxiety.
This was even the case when ‘dull’ rural images were shown leading the researchers to conclude its not just idyllic-looking places that cause this feeling of calm.
These findings are just preliminary results shared with The Independent and the researchers plan to test the theory further to find out exactly why this happens.
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Read the full article at: dailymail.co.uk
