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The science of spaces

Your body still reads every room the way it once read the open land.

The senses never stopped scanning for danger. Every sound, shadow, surface, scent and taste is information the body uses to decide whether it can rest. A space either helps answer that question or keeps it open.

An original render of a still pool in a stone room, with a ring of amber light hanging above it and mirrored in the water. No people; it shows the atmosphere we design toward.

Designing for the human

Most spaces are designed around tasks, budgets and square footage. Holistic health design starts somewhere else: with the person inside the room, as a whole body and a whole nervous system, not a set of jobs to get done.

  • The whole personBody, senses, mood and memory, all at once. Not only the eyes, and never only the floor plan.
  • Every sense, togetherLight, sound, texture, scent and space reach you as one experience, so we design them as one.
  • Settling as the measureA space works when the body can stop scanning and settle. That is what we design toward.
The time capsule The five senses Sources

The time capsule

300,000 years of the senses.

Click a moment to explore the history

The mismatch, to scale Each bar is the roughly 300,000 years our species has existed. The colored end is how long we have lived with each change.
Farming and settled life 12,000 years · 4%
Electric light 145 years · 0.05%
Smartphones 19 years · 0.006%

The last two are too thin to see at this scale. That is the point: our senses were tuned in a world without any of them.

The five senses

Explore the science of each sense.

How to read this

  • Evidence Published research, cited under each sense and listed in full in Sources.
  • Interpretation A widely used way of explaining why, not proven in every detail.
  • Observation What we commonly see in everyday spaces. Not a study.
  • Design direction What we suggest trying. Effects vary by person and place; none of this is medical care.

Choose a sense to see what the body is still asking, what many spaces do now, and what design can do about it.

Sound

Hearing

What the body listens for Interpretation

Ears never close, even in sleep. Sudden, unexplained or approaching sounds were once the first warning of danger.

What many spaces do now Evidence

Constant traffic, ventilation and crowd noise keeps the alarm half on. The WHO links long-term road noise above 53 decibels, averaged over the day, with harm to health, and advises under 45 at night.

Design that supports Design direction

Quiet refuges, soft absorbent surfaces, sound zoned by activity, and natural sound such as water to soften the hum.

Sources: WHO (2018) · Basner et al. (2014)

Sources

Sources (37)
  1. Allen, J. G., et al. (2016). Associations of cognitive function scores with carbon dioxide, ventilation, and volatile organic compound exposures in office workers. Environmental Health Perspectives, 124(6), 805–812.
  2. Appleton, J. (1975). The Experience of Landscape. London: Wiley.
  3. Aron, E. N., & Aron, A. (1997). Sensory-processing sensitivity and its relation to introversion and emotionality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73(2), 345–368.
  4. Basner, M., et al. (2014). Auditory and non-auditory effects of noise on health. The Lancet, 383(9925), 1325–1332.
  5. Ben-Sasson, A., et al. (2009). A meta-analysis of sensory modulation symptoms in individuals with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39(1), 1–11.
  6. Bratman, G. N., et al. (2019). Nature and mental health: An ecosystem service perspective. Science Advances, 5(7), eaax0903.
  7. British Standards Institution (2022). PAS 6463:2022 Design for the mind: Neurodiversity and the built environment. Guide. London: BSI.
  8. Cannon, W. B. (1915). Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage. New York: D. Appleton.
  9. Center for Universal Design (1997). The Principles of Universal Design, version 2.0. Raleigh: North Carolina State University.
  10. Craig, A. D. (2002). How do you feel? Interoception: the sense of the physiological condition of the body. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 3(8), 655–666.
  11. Dunbar, R. I. M. (2017). Breaking bread: the functions of social eating. Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, 3(3), 198–211.
  12. Dunn, W. (1997). The impact of sensory processing abilities on the daily lives of young children and their families: A conceptual model. Infants & Young Children, 9(4), 23–35.
  13. Fancourt, D., & Finn, S. (2019). What is the evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being? A scoping review. Health Evidence Network synthesis report 67. Copenhagen: WHO Regional Office for Europe.
  14. Glass, D. C., & Singer, J. E. (1972). Urban Stress: Experiments on Noise and Social Stressors. New York: Academic Press.
  15. Gooley, J. J., et al. (2011). Exposure to room light before bedtime suppresses melatonin onset and shortens melatonin duration in humans. Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 96(3), E463–E472.
  16. Hippocrates (c. 400 BCE). Airs, Waters, and Places. Hippocratic Corpus.
  17. Holt-Lunstad, J., Smith, T. B., & Layton, J. B. (2010). Social relationships and mortality risk: A meta-analytic review. PLoS Medicine, 7(7), e1000316.
  18. International WELL Building Institute (2014). WELL Building Standard, version 1.
  19. Kaplan, S. (1995). The restorative benefits of nature: toward an integrative framework. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 15(3), 169–182.
  20. Klepeis, N. E., et al. (2001). The National Human Activity Pattern Survey (NHAPS). Journal of Exposure Analysis and Environmental Epidemiology, 11(3), 231–252.
  21. LeDoux, J. E. (2000). Emotion circuits in the brain. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 23, 155–184.
  22. Löken, L. S., et al. (2009). Coding of pleasant touch by unmyelinated afferents in humans. Nature Neuroscience, 12(5), 547–548.
  23. McEwen, B. S. (1998). Protective and damaging effects of stress mediators. New England Journal of Medicine, 338(3), 171–179.
  24. National Autistic Society. Accessible environments.
  25. Nightingale, F. (1859). Notes on Nursing: What It Is, and What It Is Not. London: Harrison.
  26. Office of the U.S. Surgeon General (2023). Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community.
  27. Oldenburg, R. (1989). The Great Good Place. New York: Paragon House.
  28. Orben, A., & Przybylski, A. K. (2019). The association between adolescent well-being and digital technology use. Nature Human Behaviour, 3(2), 173–182.
  29. Panksepp, J. (1998). Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions. New York: Oxford University Press.
  30. Selye, H. (1936). A syndrome produced by diverse nocuous agents. Nature, 138, 32.
  31. Tarr, B., Launay, J., & Dunbar, R. I. M. (2014). Music and social bonding: “self-other” merging and neurohormonal mechanisms. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 1096.
  32. Twohig-Bennett, C., & Jones, A. (2018). The health benefits of the great outdoors: A systematic review and meta-analysis of greenspace exposure and health outcomes. Environmental Research, 166, 628–637.
  33. Ulrich, R. S. (1984). View through a window may influence recovery from surgery. Science, 224(4647), 420–421.
  34. Ulrich, R. S., et al. (1991). Stress recovery during exposure to natural and urban environments. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 11(3), 201–230.
  35. Wilson, E. O. (1984). Biophilia. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  36. World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe (2016). Urban green spaces and health: A review of evidence. Copenhagen.
  37. World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe (2018). Environmental Noise Guidelines for the European Region.

Plain-language summaries of published research, written for design. Not medical advice.

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