TY  - JOUR
A1  - Methorst, Joel
A1  - Bonn, Aletta
A1  - Marselle, Melissa R.
A1  - Böhning-Gaese, Katrin
A1  - Rehdanz, Katrin
T1  - Species richness is positively related to mental health – a study for Germany
T2  - Landscape and urban planning
N2  - Nature benefits human health. To date, however, little is known whether biodiversity relates to human health. While some local and city level studies show that species diversity, as a measure of biodiversity, can have positive effects, there is a lack of studies about the relationship between different species diversity measures and human health, especially at larger spatial scales. Here, we conduct cross-sectional analyses of the association between species diversity and human health across Germany, while controlling for socio-economic factors and other nature characteristics. As indicators for human health, we use the mental (MCS) and physical health (PCS) component scales of the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP, Short Form Health Questionnaire – SF12). For species diversity, we use species richness and abundance estimates of two species groups: plants and birds. We phrase the following hypotheses: plant and bird species are positively associated with mental and physical health (H1 & H3); bird abundance is positively related to mental health (H2). Our results demonstrate a significant positive relationship between plant and bird species richness and mental health across all model variations controlling for a multitude of other factors. These results highlight the importance for species diversity for people’s mental health and well-being. Therefore, policy makers, landscape planners and greenspace managers on the local and national level should consider supporting biodiverse environments to promote mental health and wellbeing. For this purpose, we propose to use species diversity measures as indicators for salutogenic (health promoting) characteristics of nature, landscape and urban green space.
KW  - Nature contributions to people
KW  - Ecosystem services
KW  - Biodiversity
KW  - Birds
KW  - Plants
KW  - Human health
Y1  - 2021
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/63099
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-630991
SN  - 1872-6062
N1  - The authors kindly acknowledge the support by the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, funded by the German Science Foundation (FZT 118, 202548816).
VL  - 211
IS  - art. 104084
SP  - 1
EP  - 11
PB  - Elsevier Science
CY  - Amsterdam [u.a.]
ER  -