Nature - deficit Disorder Plaguing Our Children

by Teresa McEntire | More from this Blogger

11 May 2006 11:32 AM

In a world where media use is on the rise causing children to spend time indoors and many children live in places where their backyard consists of a concrete slab author Richard Louv says a new disorder is affecting our children - nature deficit disorder. In his new book Last Child in the Woods, Richard Louv claims that children are losing their connection with the natural world.

Although not an official diagnosis, Richard Louv describes nature deficit disorder as an effect of withdrawing nature from childhood experiences. It increases stress and inattention and causes feelings of not being rooted in the world.

In his book Richard Louv talks about the reasons nature deficit disorder is a growing problem in our society, and not only in urban areas but suburban and rural as well.

• Children spend more time indoors. They learn about forests in school, but don't actually experience them.
• Children spend more time playing organized sports instead of free playing. Running on the grass instead of exploring the grass.
• Organized natural places, like many parks, hinder a child's ability to explore nature, don't provide a "sensation of being solitary", or provide "independence in nature, where they can use all their senses." There's nothing like the actual woods for exploring nature.
• Parents, fearing child abduction, are reluctant to let their child explore outdoors. The radius that parents allow their children to explore has shrunk to a 9th of what it was 20 years ago. Although child abductions actually happen less frequently now, they are just more widely covered by the media.
• Many children don't have time to play because they are so involved in activities. A shift has happened where "unless play takes the form of a competitive, structured activity, parents and kids think of it as just 'wasted time.'"

Richard Louv says, "The key is that as long as nature experiences are considered an extracurricular activity, nothing will change. There are folks out there who are hungry for it, who want an alternative to what is going on in terms of organized sports and over-structured lives. The minute it begins to be seen as a health issue, truly a mental health issue -- that wonderful things can happen for your child if you give them direct experiences with nature -- then it's no longer an extracurricular activity and really, it's no longer even leisure. When that kind of conceptual shift happens, I think a lot of parents will be relieved -- they'll have a logical reason to do what their instincts tell them to do anyhow."

I do have to agree with Richard Louv that many children go their entire childhood without experiencing nature and it is not surprising that it has negative side effects. As a child our favorite park was a park that had a small wooded area, we loved playing hide and go seek, watching the bugs, and running around. We rarely played on the actual playground equipment. (The forest was cut down because of the fear of child predators.) We also had a large field behind our house that we spent many hours exploring. (It was turned into a housing development.) As a teenager, we lived about ½ a mile from the mountains, and I used to find solitude in the foothills. (Unfortunately not available to most kids.)Although I can't provide empty fields and the mountains my kids do love spending time outdoors playing in the sandbox, picking up bugs, and just running around. Structured activities are left to a minimum so my kids can just enjoy being kids.

Many problems now plaguing childhood such as obesity and ADHD might be solved with something as simple as a return to nature. Richard Louv says spending time in nature "likely reduces the symptoms of ADHD and stress" while increasing "creativity, cognitive skills, and full use of the senses." So take your children to a national park, local park, or your own backyard and let them get dirty.

Learn more about Teresa McEntire

Teresa McEntire grew up in Utah the oldest of four children. She currently lives in Kuna, Idaho, near Boise. She and her husband Gene have been married for almost ten years.

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