Effects of Indirect Experience of Forest Healing Factors on Stress Reduction, Self-Esteem and Social Connectedness Improvements in the Elderly Participating in Horticultural Activities Program

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of indirect experience of forest healing factors on stress reduction and increased self-esteem and social connectedness in group-based horticultural activities. The subjects of this study were 24 elderly people aged from 60 to 77 years old. The group of 12 subjects acted as a control and participated in only gardening activities, while the other group of 12 subjects was the experimental group and participated in both forest healing session and gardening activities. In forest healing session, subjects in the experimental group watched 15-minute videos consisting of forest landscapes and sounds of water and birds in an indoor lecture hall. The program was conducted once a week for a total of 14 sessions from April to July 2017. As the result of this study, the cortisol levels, which was significantly reduced (p=.001) from 3.24ng/ml to 2.19ng/ml in the experimental group, proved that stress levels were decreased after the program. The self-esteem of the experimental group and control groups were both significantly increased (p=.001 and p=.036). Also the social connectedness of the experimental group and control groups were both significantly increased after the program (p=.001 and p=.018). However, verification of differences between two groups showed that the differences in social connectedness in the experimental group before and after the program was significant at the p-value .05 level. Group-based gardening activities are effective in building better mental health, such as increased self-esteem and social connectedness in the elderly but applying forest healing programs with auditory and visual factors to conventional horticultural activities programs could enhance the effect of mental and physical health promotion in the elderly.