The first time biology professor Dale Benham invited psychology professor Frank Ferraro to join him on the annual Archway Seminar trip to the Minnesota Boundary Waters, he had no idea that his decision to go would impact him and his future students.
Each year in the days leading up to the new academic year, Benham leads first-year students 700 miles to northeastern Minnesota for the start of a semester-long course on the necessity of wilderness.
Benham invites professors from other NWU academic departments to join him and his students to gain additional perspectives on the trip. Ferraro — who was initially hesitant about going — thought about the psychological impact of nature on humans, and decided to accept Benham's invitation to head north.
Ferraro crafted a creativity test for students to determine how much an immersion in nature affected their imaginations. Students were given the test before, during, and after the trip, and each time the scores improved. The results supported previous research that connected time spent in nature to improved cognitive skills. This prompted Ferraro to conduct further research of his own.
Ferraro continued attending the annual trips to Minnesota to expand on his findings, but a campus speaker helped spark another idea.
"Benham created the influence, but Strayer gave the idea," said Ferraro, referring to neuroscientist David Strayer who delivered the 2011 Cliff Fawl Psychology Lecture on the topic of cognitive effects of texting and driving.
Strayer’s research influenced Ferraro to create a psychology course that studies how decreased technology and increased contact with nature affect the human brain.
"Technology taxes our mental resources," said Ferraro, whose research on the topic was published last spring in the journal, Ecopsychology. "I wanted to try to restore them by taking students to the wilderness."
In June Ferraro led six students to Wyoming near North Laramie River — without technology and away from modern civilization — for an entire week. The experience was part of Ferraro's newly developed summer psychology course, “Psychological Reactions to Nature.”
"In the city, you're always on demand," said junior psychology major Zachary Tuttle from Wichita, Kan. "Being without service was nice, and not being on demand was really cool. While on the trip our class joked that without phones the world could be ending and we would have no idea."
"I loved not having my phone, the trip definitely wouldn’t have had the benefits it did if we were to have them,” added Brittany Lester, a junior psychology major from Waverly. “Our group became very close throughout the trip, and we relied on each other very heavily."
Without the aid and distraction of technology, Ferraro's class worked together to transport equipment, purify water, and heat food. Students were responsible for locating new campgrounds each day, setting up their tents and equipment and finding new sources of drinking water — hiking several miles each day to do so. The psychology professor intended this groundwork to better connect students to the natural world, and help them identify and connect the benefits of both the modern and natural environments.
"I hope they found ways to balance their natural experiences with the urban world,” said Ferraro.
The course wasn't all physical labor. Students were assigned readings on the psychology of nature and were asked to write about their experiences in the wilderness. Each evening a student was selected to lead a class discussion about the reading and connect it to their wilderness experience.
Lester said the trip taught her more about the psychological boundaries of living in the wilderness and helped her become more active.
"I became more aware of the physical endurance that I do in fact have,” she said. “I realized mental barriers are far more restricting than physical. I am a much more active individual following the trip and I also make it a point to spend more time outside."
Ferraro's students took away their own lessons from the trip, but together they learned a lot about each other, said Tuttle.
"We were stuck with each other the entire trip, so we got to know each other pretty well," he said.
Ferraro’s students learned the benefits of connecting to nature firsthand and he’s hopeful future students will get the same opportunity. But for those who are unable to plan a trip out into the wilderness, Ferraro said the concept can easily be applied right here at home.
"You don't have to go out for days, but maybe only 20 minutes,” he said. “Find local nature and don't disconnect from it."