Urban Mind research has found that seeing or hearing birds is associated with an improvement in mental wellbeing that can last up to eight hours. This improvement was also evident in people with a diagnosis of depression – the most common mental illness worldwide – indicating the potential role of birdlife in helping those with mental health conditions.

Published in Scientific Reports, the study used smartphone application Urban Mind to collect people’s real-time reports of mental wellbeing alongside their reports of seeing or hearing birdsong.

“There is growing evidence on the mental health benefits of being around nature and we intuitively think that the presence of birdsong and birds would help lift our mood. However, there is little research that has actually investigated the impact of birds on mental health in real-time and in a real environment. By using the Urban Mind app we have for the first time showed the direct link between seeing or hearing birds and positive mood. We hope this evidence can demonstrate the importance of protecting and providing environments to encourage birds, not only for biodiversity but for our mental health.” Ryan Hammoud (lead author).

Our research has been published in Scientific Reports and The Guardian, The Washington Post, National Geographic.