When I'm sitting outside, laughing with others, I feel at home.
Across six countries and five years, a quiet experiment called Recetas is asking whether the oldest medicines — sunlight, soil, and shared company — might address one of modernity's most pervasive wounds: loneliness. Drawing on decades of research into forest bathing and social prescriptions, scientists are testing whether structured time outdoors with others can reshape not just individual wellbeing, but the very architecture of healthcare itself. For asylum seekers, refugees, and isolated urban dwellers alike, early results suggest that belonging is not merely a feeling — it may be a measurable, prescribable condition of health.
- Loneliness has reached crisis proportions globally, and conventional medicine — built around individual treatment and medication — is struggling to answer a wound that is fundamentally social in nature.
- The Recetas study, spanning Barcelona, Prague, Marseille, Helsinki, Melbourne, and Ecuador, is racing to generate evidence before healthcare systems double down on pharmaceutical responses to an epidemic of disconnection.
- Participants including LGBTQIA+ asylum seekers and displaced migrants are finding unexpected relief through bat walks, beach explorations, and shared outdoor meals — activities deliberately designed to build belonging without forcing confrontation with trauma.
- Early findings point toward a cascade of benefits: reduced stress hormones, lower blood pressure, quieted rumination in the brain, and a restored capacity for present-moment social connection.
- If the study succeeds, it could pressure health systems in six nations to restructure care around community participation and nature access — a significant institutional shift away from clinic-centered, medication-first models.
Kye Aziz, an Indonesian asylum seeker living in Melbourne, had never considered himself someone drawn to nature — until a prescribed picnic and a gardening session changed something in him. Sitting outside, laughing with others, he found a feeling he had not expected to find in Australia: home. "Living here can be very lonely and individualistic," he says, "but when I'm outside with others, I feel at home."
The science behind that feeling stretches back to 1980s Japan, where the government launched "shinrinyoku" — forest bathing — as a public health response to urban stress. Decades of research have since confirmed what that initiative intuited: time in nature lowers blood pressure, stabilizes the nervous system, reduces stress hormones, and quiets the brain region associated with rumination and isolation. The naturalist Edward Wilson called this pull toward living systems "biophilia" — an innate human orientation that, when honored, makes us calmer, more present, and more open to one another.
A global study called Recetas is now testing whether these effects can be deliberately prescribed. Launched in 2019 by researcher Jill Litt at the University of Colorado Boulder, the five-year project spans six cities across Europe, Australia, and Ecuador, combining nature engagement, outdoor group activities, and social connection to address loneliness as a health crisis. Litt's insight was simple but radical: getting your hands dirty with others seemed to matter. She began imagining what would happen if nature, outdoor participation, and group belonging were woven together into a single prescription.
Now in its fourth year, Recetas is building on two converging bodies of evidence — that social prescriptions reduce loneliness, and that nature contact produces measurable health benefits — while becoming one of the first large studies to examine their combined effect specifically on loneliness. "Spending two hours face-to-face with people is revolutionary in the accelerated world we live in," says co-researcher Laura Coll-Planas. "But nature brings a different kind of social connection."
Some of that difference runs deep. People near green spaces report fewer episodes of loneliness. Nature restores attention, freeing people from negative thought loops and preparing them for genuine present-moment connection. And for many participants, the outdoors awakens memory — of childhood, of grandparents, of safety. Researcher Nerkez Opacin, working with LGBTQIA+ asylum seekers in Melbourne, has watched nature unlock nostalgia for participants who fled their home countries. "Even though many have fled, nature reminds them of a time when they felt safe there," he says. "It's always a positive feeling."
Over eight weeks, Opacin's group explored beaches, observed bats, and walked "sniff-safaris" through scented plants. Shared outdoor meals became unexpectedly powerful — not just for nourishment, but for sparking conversations across cultures. Opacin deliberately frames everything around connection and belonging rather than loneliness itself, knowing the word alone can overwhelm. For Aziz, the shift was less about individual friendships than about finding a group to belong to — a comfort once familiar in Indonesia, now rediscovered under Australian skies. "It kind of killed my loneliness," he says. Once tasted, that belonging made the isolation that had preceded it finally, fully visible — and finally, fully past.
Kye Aziz had never thought of himself as someone drawn to nature. An asylum seeker from Indonesia now living in Melbourne, he had spent plenty of time in rural areas and mountain regions back home. But something shifted when he joined a picnic and a gardening session—activities prescribed to him as part of a social treatment program. Suddenly, the outdoors felt different. "You feel like you've been transported somewhere else," he says. "Living in Australia and experiencing Western culture can be very lonely and individualistic, but when I'm sitting outside, laughing with others, I feel at home."
There is science behind that feeling. In the 1980s, the Japanese government launched a public health initiative called "shinrinyoku"—forest bathing—designed to help stressed urban workers heal through nature. What began as intuition has become measurable fact. Researchers including Qing Li, a physician and clinical professor at Nippon Medical School in Tokyo, have documented that forest bathing correlates with lower blood pressure, a stabilized nervous system, reduced stress hormones, strengthened immunity, and decreased anxiety, depression, anger, and fatigue. The naturalist Edward Wilson attributed these benefits to "biophilia," an innate human love of nature that explains our tendency to interact with plants, animals, and other people. By making us calmer and more present, nature can interrupt the destructive thought patterns that deepen loneliness—which is, importantly, a subjective experience rather than an objective state. Studies have shown that contact with nature reduces neural activity in the subgenual prefrontal cortex, a brain region linked to rumination, those repetitive negative thought cycles associated with isolation.
Now, preliminary results from an unprecedented global experiment in nature-based social prescriptions are suggesting something more: that spending time outdoors with others can fundamentally reshape how people understand their own health, medical care, and loneliness itself. The study, called Recetas, is a five-year investigation spanning six countries—Barcelona, Prague, Marseille, Helsinki, Melbourne, and Cuenca in Ecuador—testing whether combining nature engagement, outdoor group activities, and social connection can alleviate loneliness, improve health, and reduce pressure on healthcare systems. The project emerged in 2019, just before the COVID-19 pandemic made loneliness a global health crisis, when researcher Jill Litt at the University of Colorado Boulder noticed something while observing community gardening programs: getting your hands dirty and being with others seemed to matter deeply. She began imagining other nature-based group activities—bird watching, trail walks—and after reading work by Laura Coll-Planas, a physician and public health researcher at the University of Vic-Central University in Barcelona, she wondered what would happen if these three ingredients mixed: nature engagement, outdoor participation, and social connection with a group.
Now in its fourth year, Recetas is in testing phases with support from local health systems. If successful, Litt says, it could transform the care model itself, making it more person-centered, less dependent on medication, and more reliant on communities as active participants in health management. The research builds on two growing bodies of evidence: that various social prescriptions—from cooking classes to art workshops—reduce loneliness, and that nature contact brings measurable health benefits. A recent University of Exeter study showed that nature prescriptions not only significantly increased participant happiness and life satisfaction but also reduced medical care costs. Australian researchers found similar prescriptions lowered blood pressure. But Recetas is among the largest studies specifically examining nature-based social prescriptions' effects on loneliness itself. "In the accelerated world we live in, spending two hours face-to-face with other people is revolutionary and powerful for our health," Coll-Planas says. "But this is the first time we're doing this kind of research outdoors, and we've already seen how nature brings a different kind of social connection."
Some of these effects seem almost hardwired. People living near green spaces report fewer episodes of loneliness, while those in "lonely" environments—marked by car dependency and sparse vegetation—tend to withdraw socially. Another theory suggests nature restores our attention, preparing us for more positive social interactions in the present rather than trapping us in negative ones from the past. Yet another dimension emerges through memory: researchers have observed people speaking about nature nostalgically, connecting it to childhood, time with grandparents, other positive moments. This is precisely what Nerkez Opacin, a researcher at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology working with Many Coloured Sky, a partner organization serving LGBTQIA+ asylum seekers, has witnessed. "Nature often awakens nostalgia and beautiful memories of home, and even though many of our participants have fled their countries, nature reminds them of a time when they felt safe there," he says. "It's always a positive feeling."
For eight weeks, Opacin's group engaged in bat observation, beach exploration, and "sniff-safaris"—nature walks where participants deliberately experience plant scents. Activities were co-created based on participant interests and local resources. Sharing meals outdoors emerged as unexpectedly powerful, not just for filling stomachs before exploration but for sparking conversation about different cultures and deepening mutual understanding. Opacin deliberately avoids dwelling on loneliness itself, knowing the topic can overwhelm people. Instead, he frames activities around connection, friendship, and belonging. "When the group activity was ending, I realized how much I would miss that routine, seeing the same people every week, spending time in nature and feeling that sense of belonging," Aziz reflects. "It kind of killed my loneliness." For him, the shift was not about individual friendships but about connecting to a group as a whole, finding the comfort and familiarity he had known in his own country—a belonging that, once tasted, made the isolation that preceded it finally lift.
Citações Notáveis
In the accelerated world we live in, spending two hours face-to-face with other people is revolutionary and powerful for our health.— Laura Coll-Planas, physician and public health researcher
Nature often awakens nostalgia and beautiful memories of home, and even though many of our participants have fled their countries, nature reminds them of a time when they felt safe there.— Nerkez Opacin, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology researcher
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why does nature seem to work where other interventions might fail?
Because it operates on multiple levels at once. It calms your nervous system, yes, but it also creates space for memory and belonging. When you're outside with others, you're not being asked to "fix" your loneliness—you're just being present. That's the difference.
But couldn't people get the same benefit from any group activity—a book club, a gym class?
Possibly some of it. But nature does something specific. It restores attention, pulls you out of rumination. A book club might keep you in your head. Nature interrupts that loop.
The study involves asylum seekers and LGBTQIA+ refugees. Is nature-based prescription especially powerful for people who've experienced displacement?
It seems to be. For Aziz, the outdoor group became a replacement for the sense of home he'd lost. Nature connected him to memories of safety from his country, but in a new place. That's not just healing—that's integration.
What happens when the eight-week program ends? Does the benefit persist?
That's the honest question the researchers are still asking. Opacin noticed people got emotional about the routine ending. The study is tracking that. But the fact that people *felt* belonging, even temporarily, suggests something real shifted.
If this works at scale, what changes in how doctors treat loneliness?
Instead of prescribing medication or therapy alone, they'd write a prescription for a weekly bird-watching group or community garden. It's cheaper, it builds community infrastructure, and it treats the actual problem—disconnection—rather than just the symptom.
Is there a risk that nature-based prescription becomes just another box to check, another program that loses its meaning?
Absolutely. That's why co-creation matters. If the activities are designed *with* people, not *for* them, they stay alive. The sniff-safari wasn't in the original plan. It emerged because someone noticed what participants actually needed.