Behavioral Dysfunction and the Natural Environment

Katy Pelchy
Behavioral Dysfunction and the Natural Environment
Outside Reading

“Solitude is learned behavior. It is a capacity that results from a natural progression of the self nurtured in the natural environment. The further removed we have become from the natural environment and its attendant exposure to healthy aloneness, the less we have been able to properly develop our capacity for solitude. With much of today’s population living almost exclusively in the built environment, it is of little wonder we should see large-scale behavioral dysfunction in solitude development.”

This quote that I came across during my literature citations assignment struck a spark in me and I had to save it. I had never though of this idea before, but once I heard it, I realized how true it is. There is something about nature that elicits the response of actually wanting to be alone in it. When one is taken from nature, the want to be alone and contemplate is taken away. This, in turn, takes away one’s ability to learn how to be alone, and therefore takes away the ability to have healthy solitude at all.

Interpersonal relationships have become a crutch for many people. In observing my brother when he was younger, I remember he used to get incredibly antsy after school if he couldn’t find someone to be with. He would call every person he knew, and if that failed, then he would be restless and agitated the rest of the day. I see now how this could come to be. He never spent any time alone, due to the fact that we live in suburbia where there are few places to have real solitude. Furthermore, we live in a society that often scorns people wanting alone time, since it is seen as being socially outcast and separates that person from the rest of the group. Really, we ARE hindering ourselves from developing normally. And the effects ARE seen in the growing number of behavioral problems, especially in today’s youth.

Nowadays doctors are quick to put the label “ADD” or “ADHD” to a growing number of kids. That seems to be the quick fix of a supposed problem that nobody really knows the answer to. Would nature not supply the fix for that, as well? Perhaps all those kids need is a bit of land to explore to calm them down. A little bit of alone time in the woods, doing whatever makes that person happy, has effects unequaled in terms of healing and development. That’s all we really need: some solitude in nature.