Nature and Wellbeing in the Digital Age by Sue Thomas

Author:Sue Thomas [Thomas, Sue]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: computers, nature, NONFICTION, self-help, mind
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 2017-04-02T22:00:00+00:00

Zynga, the company behind FarmVille, got in touch when Slate published my piece ‘Gazing at Virtual Nature Is Good for Your Psychological Well-Being’.[xxxv] Apparently, my research matched up with their own findings from extensive focus group testing into the reasons why people play the game, but they had not heard of biophilia nor seen the environmental psychology studies which explained those reasons. They told me that a fair percentage of players reported feeling strongly connected to nature when they played FarmVille, and many used it to relax and de-stress. Some players who had no access to their own piece of land saw it as a substitute for real gardening.

Their experience correlates with those described by Holly Nielsen in an interesting Guardian article on what she calls ‘sentimental pastoralism’ in video games.[xxxvi] She writes ‘there has been a discovery that the uncertainties and rhythms of farming make good gaming fodder. Zynga’s early Facebook game FarmVille was a spectacular success, attracting over 40 million active users, with its simplified take on crop production and animal care’. There are other farming games, too, such as ‘Farming Simulator’ which, she says, ‘has shown that there’s a mass audience for authentic simulation complete with branded machinery and multiple authentic livestock breeds’.

Nielsen admits she’s not immune to the seduction of the idealised rural life. ‘Throughout history humans have been preoccupied with understanding and ‘getting back’ to a Golden Age of natural harmony – which of course never really existed. In our efforts to associate with this ‘purer’ existence, we’ve idealised the experience of rural life. Video games are just the latest means of doing that. Since moving to London I’ve found myself craving titles such as Animal Crossing and Story of Seasons. Like Marie Antoinette playing at being a milkmaid in her purpose built farm, I delve into an equally superficial homestead to sate my desire for simplicity and escape.’

The benefits of FarmVille and the many other games discussed in Nielsen’s article are not just biophilic; they offer a sense of a nature-based community too, one which is subject to the seasons, the passage of the sun, and the shared day-to-day earthiness of country toil. Together, the players come together to raise barns, collect in crops, and rescue each other from natural calamities.

In real life it’s easy to see how, when sitting at your office desk, squeezed into a corner on a busy commuter train, or relaxing at the end of a day of abstract and apparently meaningless work, you can enjoy tending your virtual garden and caring for your online cows and sheep.

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