Nature contact and environmental sustainability at work

Nature contact at work can be conceptualized actively as a health behavior (e.g., Maddock & Razani, Reference Maddock and Razani2024) and passively as a design feature (e.g., Reference Ostner, Appel-Meulenbroek and DanivskaOstner, Reference Ostner, Appel-Meulenbroek and Danivska2021). Health behavior studies have examined employee outcomes of taking outdoor work breaks (e.g., Sianoja et al., Reference Sianoja, Syrek, de Bloom, Korpela and Kinnunen2018), spending nonwork time out doors (e.g., Klotz et al., Reference Klotz, McClean, Yim, Koopman and Tang2023), or both (e.g., Brossoit et al., Reference Brossoit, Crain, Leslie, Fisher and Eakman2024; Hyvönen et al., Reference Hyvönen, Törnroos, Salonen, Korpela, Feldt and Kinnunen2018). Another line of research has examined the physical quality of the work environment, including “biophilic” design features like natural light and indoor plants (e.g., Sadick & Kamardeen, Reference Sadick and Kamardeen2020), outdoor workspaces (e.g., Petersson Troije et al., Reference Petersson Troije, Lisberg Jensen, Stenfors, Bodin Danielsson, Hoff, Mårtensson and Toivanen2021), and home offices (e.g., Srivastava et al., Reference Srivastava, Murnane, Billington and Samuelson2024). Some studies capture both health behaviors (e.g., spending time outside during the workday) in combination with natural workspace design features (e.g., Brossoit et al., InPress; Largo-Wight et al., Reference Largo-Wight, Chen, Dodd and Weiler2011; Thompson & Bruk-Lee, Reference Thompson and Bruk-Lee2019). Overall, there is a growing literature demonstrating how nature contact can facilitate recovery from work stress, re-energize employees, and enhance employee health and well-being (e.g., Alameer et al., Reference Alameer, Uitdewilligen and andHülsheger2023; Brossoit & Leslie, Reference Brossoit and Leslie2025; Hilbert et al., Reference Hilbert, Finke, Küpper, Binnewies, Berkemeyer and Maunz2025; Klotz & Bolino, Reference Klotz and Bolino2021).

We appreciate Kühner et al.’s urgent call to investigate high-impact behaviors and contextual factors that have the greatest promise in facilitating environmental sustainability. Our extended call to blend the literatures on nature contact and environmental sustainability at work captures “(a) behaviors with substantial (positive or negative) environmental consequences, and (b) systemic changes at the meso, macro, and magnolevels that cause widespread behavior changes” (Kühner et al., pg. 25), and offers ways to address specific recommendations in the focal article (particularly #2, individual-level motivators and barriers of high-impact employee green behaviors, and #6, work design to facilitate employee green behaviors).

Regarding microbehaviors with substantial environmental impacts, we return to the idea of nature as a health behavior. Despite the well-established benefits of nature, the average American spends nearly all their time indoors (e.g., Kellert et al., Reference Kellert, Case, Escher, Witter, Mikels-Carrasco and Seng2017). Disconnectedness from nature is likely related to indifference towards protecting it. This notion is well-established in the environmental psychology literature; meta-analytic work has demonstrated that contact with nature and having a sense of connectedness to the natural world are positively associated with pro-environmental (“green”) behaviors (e.g., Mackay & Schmitt, Reference Mackay and Schmitt2019; Soga & Gaston, Reference Soga and Gaston2024). As an illustrative workplace example, the prototypical office setting—one that lacks biophilic design features and where the entirety of an employees’ time is spent inside a building—may elicit an “out of sight, out of mind” phenomena that could hinder employee green behaviors and an organization’s sustainability goals. Learning about environmentally conscious behaviors at work (“green training”) has been shown to translate to ecofriendly behaviors (Usman et al., Reference Usman, Rofcanin, Ali, Ogbonnaya and Babalola2023). In a similar vein and aligned with the idea that biospheric values can increase employee green behaviors (Kühner et al.; Ruepert et al., Reference Ruepert, Keizer, Steg, Maricchiolo, Carrus, Dumitru, Mira, Stancu and Moza2016), providing opportunities for nature contact at work may enhance employees’ appreciation for nature and inclination to protect it (e.g., Valor et al., Reference Valor, Redondo and Carrero2025), as well as immediately improve performance drivers like mood and attention. Overall, green training and nature exposure at work go hand in hand as powerful individual-level motivators; although training builds ecoconscious habits, contact with nature deepens employees’ connection to the environment. Together, they have the potential to drive meaningful sustainability change in the workplace.

Rethinking work design through a sustainability lens highlights an opportunity to incorporate natural elements into the physical environment to signal environmental values and encourage green behavior. Building from Kühner and colleagues’ ideas for promoting sustainability from job characteristics, we propose that integrating natural elements into the physical design of the workplace (e.g., biophilic features like plants or water) may offer additional subtle, ongoing “nudges” about the sustainability values of the organization (Brand & Augustin, Reference Brand and Augustin2021). The built environment has an influence on employees’ decisions about which organizations to join and whether to stay long term, and can ultimately guide how employees feel and behave at work (e.g., motivation, engagement, attitudes; Maier et al., Reference Maier, Baccarella, Wagner, Meinel, Eismann and Voigt2022; Oyedeji et al., Reference Oyedeji, Ko and Lee2025). In this way, infusing natural elements in the workplace is not just an aesthetic choice. Instead, natural elements in the workplace may serve as impactful context-driven cues that align employees with the organization’s sustainability values and foster employee green behavior.

In sum, we view the nature contact literature as complementary and intertwined with the environmental sustainability literature and believe that integrating these adjacent streams of research is well-aligned with the “impact-first” approach proposed by Kühner and colleagues. Ultimately, our intention is to broaden the call for research that will have the greatest potential impact on reducing the consequences of climate change via promotion of organizational environmental sustainability.

Opportunities and challenges for future interdisciplinary work

The nature contact and environmental sustainability literatures, although largely separate, are in harmony; each has the potential to be strengthened by the other. Additionally, both research areas are interdisciplinary, making their potential integration even more impactful. The significance of interdisciplinary work is aligned with the Total Worker Health (TWH) approach, developed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, which emphasizes the need for a comprehensive approach to supporting worker health, safety, and well-being. TWH appreciates how the physical work environment (e.g., hazards, exposures, built environment) acts as a determinant of health and well-being by drawing from multiple perspectives, such as architecture and design, psychology, and public health (Banks et al., Reference Banks, LaFrance, Mac, Iley, Abbott and Yelin2025). Collaborations among scholars who study nature contact and environmental sustainability in the workplace are both timely and necessary, and initiatives like the Nature and Health Alliance (NHA) exemplify how integrating these diverse fields can shape healthier, more sustainable work environments. The NHA was founded in 2022 to “enhance understanding of, foster evidence for, and communicate about the relationships between nature and health,” with environmental sustainability integral to this mission; “by raising awareness of the human health benefits of nature engagement, we promote reciprocal actions between humans and the health of the environment” (NHA, 2024). The NHA already has active I-O members and offers one avenue for building interdisciplinary teams. Despite the promise of interdisciplinary work, it also presents challenges and requires additional effort to ensure effective communication across distinct fields (e.g., understanding and balancing respective jargon, research paradigms, methodologies, and other disciplinary norms). Yet, interdisciplinarity is regarded as necessary for scientific progress and has been advocated as a powerful strategy to solve society’s most pressing problems (Schmidt, Reference Schmidt2008).

Nature contact can help meet the goal of promoting sustainable behaviors in the workplace, but environmental sustainability can also address oversights in the nature contact literature, demonstrating another advantage of integrating these areas. For instance, an additional challenge of this work is balancing nature-related strategies enacted by workplaces with environmental ethics, justice, and best practices. For example, some of the commonly used tactics for “greening” the workplace (e.g., flower arrangements, worksite gardens, water features) may have unintended consequences (e.g., resource consumption, disruption or displacement of native plants or animals during renovation or redesign efforts). Harm may also be caused to human inhabitants as the result of “green gentrification” (Rigolon & Collins, Reference Rigolon and Collins2023). There are additional risks associated with nature contact (e.g., air pollution, allergic reactions), which may inadvertently disrupt employee experiences and organizational goals (e.g., Khan et al., Reference Khan, Patel and Barnes2024). This is a critical area where interdisciplinary projects are needed. Scholars with complementary expertise can contribute to workplace redesign efforts, nature-based interventions, and environmental sustainability initiatives to ensure these approaches include multiple perspectives that simultaneously promote employee health and well-being while also preventing undue harm to people (e.g., exacerbating inequities related to environmental racism) or the planet (e.g., commercialization and commodification of nature). Co-locating nature contact efforts and sustainability are starting to occur in practice. For example, at Houston Methodist Hospital, the Center for Health & Nature is located within the Division of Sustainability. This allows for learning and communication across disciplines and provides concrete reminders of the need for sustainability efforts.