Perhaps there’s a potted plant in your room right now. It may be some species of succulent, a colourful flower, or maybe it’s a quaint bonsai tree. If there is a potted plant, what were your reasons for buying? Was it for aesthetics, to try and liven up your room, or maybe you’re trying to improve your room’s air quality. Have you felt though that you work better or have a better mood in rooms with plants? Are those feelings simply due to placebo, or do plants actually have a positive effect on your health?
Do potted plants have tangible health benefits? Wikimedia
If you bought a plant to get some cleaner air though, you may be out of luck. A recent study found that potted plants aren’t actually that useful in removing large amounts of volatile organic chemicals, and that to get any significant effect you would need quite a few plants. So if you’ve picked out a potted plant to improve your room’s air quality, it may just be better to open a window or use a fan.
However, this isn’t to say that the effects of indoor plants are non-existent or insignificant. There’s been many different studies which suggest that indoor plants do have concrete and quantifiable effects, though these effects are typically on the psychological side, and in our hectic day to day lives, perhaps it’s something we need.
One study shows that interacting with plants actually resulted in the subjects feeling more comforted and soothed, and even resulted in lower diastolic blood pressure. This doesn’t mean that indoor plants will magically cure your high blood pressure, but it does show that indoor plants can have some tangible effect on your mental state. Another study showed that office workers who worked in offices with plants felt better about their job and also felt they had higher quality-of-life compared to workers in offices without any plants.
Not only do indoor plants appear to have positive mental health benefits, it’s also been found that plants can potentially have a positive effect on a person’s creativity and mood. Participants in a study, particularly women, were found to perform better and have a better mood when doing tasks in a room with a potted plant compared to a room with no objects or other objects in it.
The benefits of potted plants are numerous, so perhaps making space for a potted plant if you don’t have one would be a good idea. After all, even the simplest things can help break the occasional monotony of life.
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