The association between plant diversity and perceived emotions for visitors in urban forests: A pilot study across 49 parks in China

• Published in: Urban forestry & urban greening 2022-07, Vol.73, p.127613, Article 127613
• Main Authors: Wei, Hongxu, Zhang, Jie, Xu, Zhihui, Hui, Tengfei, Guo, Peng, Sun, Yuxiang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Exposure to green space; Face reading technique; Forest experience; Mental health and well-being; Species richness; Touch nature
• ISSN: 1618-8667; 1610-8167
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ufug.2022.127613

Urbanization introduces uncertainties to the biodiversity of plant communities. The perception of biodiversity can be associated with positive mental health and well-being, but direct evidence is still insufficient. In this study, we collected data about plant biodiversity assessments from studies on urban forests in the literature of China’s national knowledge infrastructure. Records of the species amount, Shannon index, and Simpson index were extracted from 49 urban forest parks in 13 cities across mainland China from 2018 to 2021. A total of 1938 facial photos were obtained from microblogs with check-in locations at these parks in the Sina Microblog in 2020. Happy, sad, and neutral emotions and positive response index (PRI; happy minus sad) were rated and mapped for spatial distributions. The amount of species was distributed as a heterogeneous pattern for all plant types, and biodiversity was higher in the northern regions (e.g., ~55% in Qingdao and over 50% in Taiyuan) than in southern cities along the Yangtze River (e.g., ~35% in Huaihua and Changsha). Trees did not account for the association of biodiversity with emotional expressions. Smiles were elicited mostly in parks with more diverse shrubs (Shannon index: R=0.4335; P = 0.0029) and herbs (R=0.6162; P = 0.0008). Females showed more smiles than males (47% vs. 32%, respectively; F=39.15, P