Gardening: a strategy for health promotion in older women.

One of the goals of Healthy People 2010 is improved cognitive status of older adults. Preliminary research has identified gardening as an activity that may be cognitively protective. Clarification of gardening as a concept is a first step toward the development of theory that will enable nurses to develop interventions related to gardening. The purpose of this study was to describe the phenomenon of gardening. Using a phenomenological methodology, interviews with five older women were analyzed using Colaizzi's approach. Four themes emerged: "Gardening is challenge and work," "Gardening is connection," "Gardening is continuous learning," and "Gardening is sensory and aesthetic experience." The phenomenon of gardening is analogous to the relationship between a spider and its web, linking internal and external environments and providing support over a lifetime. It appears that the gardening experience, as an evolving lifelong process, sustains older women in their cognitive and spiritual development.