Virtual Nature: Investigating The Effect of Biomass on Immersive Virtual Reality Forest Bathing Applications For Stress Reduction

Shinrin-yoku, also known as forest bathing, is a nature immersion practice that has been shown to have restorative effects on mental health. Recently, applications of shinrin-yoku in virtual reality (VR) have been investigated as means of providing similar mental health benefits to people that do not have direct access to nature. These applications have shown similar health benefits, although not to the extent of real nature. The factors that make VR nature immersion effective are little researched to date. This paper investigates the Biophilia Hypothesis in the context of a VR-based nature immersion experience. Twenty-six participants were immersed in a computer-generated virtual natural environment that was either high in biomass (forest) or devoid of biomass (canyon), after experiencing an arithmetic stressor task. We compared multiple restorative outcomes between the high and low biomass groups, as well as preference ratings for real and virtual high and low biomass scenes among all participants. Our results call for further investigation into data trends we observed.