Why nature connection matters: An undervalued response to the challenges of our time

When we think about responses to the climate crisis, global conflict, mental ill-health, or poverty, certain answers come readily to mind. Technology. Policy. Investment. Behaviour change campaigns. What rarely appears on the list — and yet is supported by a growing and increasingly urgent body of evidence — is the quality of the human relationship with the natural world.

Nature connection is not a niche concern. It is not a lifestyle aspiration for people who can afford to care about such things, nor an add-on to the more serious business of addressing global problems. It is a foundational dimension of human experience that shapes how we feel, how we act, and what kind of world we collectively choose to build. And for the most part, we are not treating it that way.

This post accompanies a diagram I have developed exploring what the evidence says about nature connection across ten of the challenges currently shaping our world. It is not an exhaustive literature review. But it is an attempt to demonstrate what we might be missing when we consider how to tackle some of the world biggest challenges and crises.

What is nature connection — and why does it matter?

Nature connection is not simply time spent outdoors, though that can help. It is the quality of the relationship between a person and the living world — how deeply they notice it, feel part of it, find meaning in it, and care for it. Research by the University of Derby's Nature Connectedness Research Group has consistently shown that this felt relationship matters enormously: it is associated with better mental wellbeing, stronger pro-environmental behaviour, and a greater sense of meaning and purpose (Nature Connectedness Research Group, n.d.).

Crucially, nature connection is a quality that can be cultivated. It grows through attention, through beauty, through care, through making things with natural materials, through noticing the world outside a window.

Urbanisation, screen time, the design of built environments, and the pace of modern economic life have all contributed to a steady erosion of everyday contact with the natural world. The result is not just personal loss. It is, the evidence suggests, contributing to some of the most intractable challenges of our time.

An undervalued response

Consider mental health. Over one billion people worldwide live with mental or addictive disorders, at a cost to the UK economy alone of an estimated £118 billion annually — approximately 5% of GDP (LSE and Mental Health Foundation, 2022). Poor mental health is one of the leading drivers of unemployment and reduced earning capacity. Nature connectedness is consistently associated with reduced anxiety, depression, and stress, and with greater happiness, vitality, and life satisfaction — independent of how much time is actually spent outdoors (Alcock et al., 2025). Biodiverse environments produce stronger wellbeing benefits than less diverse ones (Hammoud et al., 2024). Connecting people with nature is a significant and underinvested lever in one of our most urgent public health challenges.

Or consider the climate crisis. We understand the science. We have the technology, broadly speaking. What we often lack is the felt motivation to act — the sense that the natural world is something we belong to and are responsible for rather than a resource we manage or a backdrop to human activity. Research consistently shows that people who feel more connected to nature are significantly more likely to adopt pro-environmental behaviours, support climate policy, and engage in ecological stewardship (Guazzini et al., 2025; Richardson et al., 2022). Nature connection is the cultural bridge between knowing about ecological crisis and caring enough to act. It is also a direct climate response: the more people connecting with and caring for peatlands, forests, and wetlands, the more their preservation and restoration reduces carbon loss and captures carbon. Nature restoration can capture carbon at a scale that few other interventions can match.

The same pattern appears across challenge after challenge. Urban green space is consistently associated with lower levels of crime and violence, stronger community trust, and reduced antisocial behaviour (Wo and Rogers, 2024). Access to quality nature improves health outcomes, reduces health inequalities, and supports active lifestyles — yet green space remains unequally distributed, with deprived communities having least access to what would benefit them most. The global green economy, which depends directly on people having the ecological literacy and stewardship values that nature connection builds, is projected to create 24 million jobs worldwide by 2030 (ILO). Biodiversity loss — driven in large part by human disconnection from the living systems we depend on — threatens the livelihoods of 200 million people globally who depend directly on healthy fisheries, forests, and ecosystems for their survival (World Bank, 2024).

None of this means that nature connection is a silver bullet. The challenges described in this diagram require structural change, policy reform, significant investment, and collective action at every scale. But the evidence shows the quality of the human relationship with the living world is a dimension of these challenges that we can no longer ignore.

What this means in practice

If nature connection is as important as the evidence suggests, the implications are wide-ranging. Nature connection needs to be considered in the design of built environments — from interiors to urban green infrastructure. It needs to be factored into programme design across health, education, social care, and employment. It needs to be thought about in procurement and supply chains. Nature connection matters in how we grow food, how we design communities, how we structure working life.

I'd love to see a world where our first instinct, faced with almost any problem, is to ask how reconnecting with and caring for nature might help. If we can reconnect and care better for the ecosystem we depend on, life could get better for us humans, and for all life on earth. A nature-filled world could be a peaceful, happy, beautiful world.

The interactive diagram below explores the evidence across ten challenges. Click any segment to read more. The references for each claim are listed at the foot of the diagram.

I'm Michelle — founder of Earth & Origin. I write about how the spaces we design, the programmes we build, and the communities we shape can help us live in better relationship with the natural world. If you've read this far, you might enjoy my other posts below — or subscribe to the newsletter for new writing when it lands.