• Wellbeing benefits of greenspaces are well documented across different demographics but less is known about how we experience therapeutic effects from contact with nature. • Increasing recognition exists for moving beyond existing exposure-based linear models to better capture the complex, context-dependent mechanisms linking nature and wellbeing. • Qualitative metasynthesis enabled critical exploration of how subjective experiences of living nature for adults can impact human wellbeing. • A person-centred conceptual framework was developed highlighting multisensory immersive experiences, attunement, meaning-making and relational values as central to therapeutic nature encounters. The natural environment is increasingly acknowledged as an important factor for influencing human health and wellbeing, with growing agreement among policymakers, researchers, and practitioners of its benefits. While nature access and quality are important considerations, wellbeing benefits may be more closely linked to individuals’ perceptions as opposed to the environmental characteristics. Due to a complex of personal and socio-cultural factors influencing the nature-wellbeing relationship, traditional linear models may not be sensitive enough to explore the nuanced, context dependent processes of how people relate to nature. To address this gap, we carried out a qualitative metasynthesis review of 49 studies exploring how direct experiences of living nature can impact human wellbeing for adults. Through iteration, interpretation and critique, the findings were organised into a theoretical framework. The review provides deeper and more nuanced understandings of the nature-wellbeing relationship than existing pathway models by unpacking how therapeutic nature encounters are formed through embodied sense-making, shifting attention from objective exposure to subjective experience. Findings highlight the importance of how we relate to nature through multisensory immersive experiences and attunement. The review also demonstrates that the diverse wellbeing outcomes people experience from nature, both hedonic and eudemonic, can only be fully understood by acknowledging how individuals make meaning from their lived experiences, recognising that emotion laden interpretation is central to human nature. The findings have both theoretical and practical relevance, highlighting the importance of: integrating experimental and more tacit forms of knowledge; relational values; and person-centred approaches to designing nature programmes and spaces.
Bekkum et al. (Thu,) studied this question.