Fukumoto and colleagues evaluated the effects of plants in offices on the moods and cognitive performance of people in those spaces. They report that “Indoor greening rooms with Japanese and tropical designs were used along with the green-free (control) design in this study. The heart rate variability of the participants was not affected by green designs. However, there was improvement in impressions on tropical and Japanese designs in office rooms. In particular, the Japanese design was more effective in decreasing negative emotions than the tropical design. . . . Taken together with the psychological data, indoor greening with the tropical design promoted positive mood states. Meanwhile, indoor greening in the Japanese design, inhibited negative mood states. However, there were no significant differences between the two designs in terms of cognitive task performance. Hence, indoor greening increases neural efficiency during cognitive tasks. . . . The Japanese design involved greening with plants of indigenous species in Japan and East Asia, and the tropical design involved greening with tropical species.”
Hiroyuki Fukumoto, Mashiro Shimoda, and Saeko Hoshino. 2024. “The Effects of Different Designs of Indoor Biophilic Greening on Psychological and Physiological Responses and Cognitive Performance of Office Workers.” PLoS ONE, vol. 19, no. 7, e0307934, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0307934