Bloomsbury Academic Alone with Nature: The Psychology of Environmental Attunement

What happens when you are alone in nature and why does it matter? By looking at exceptional experiences of solitude in nature, Eugene Hughes offers a clear articulation of the phenomenon that greatly enhances our comprehension of the human-nature relationship. Through interviews with people around the world, including land artists living in caves, wilderness rites of passage guides in the Sahara Desert, and ancestral healers in Amazonian rain forests, Hughes discovers that alone with nature, under certain conditions, people experience an embodied state of connection to their environment that has an extraordinary effect on their sense of self. Hughes names this state environmental attunement, identifies its defining characteristics, the conditions it occurs under, and what effect it has on people’s sense of self provides. Including extracts from interviews and drawing on recent breakthroughs in cognitive sciences, aesthetics and psychology, he demonstrates how this unique state of consciousness stands out from other states. This is a powerful framework for interdisciplinary discourse, inspiring fresh ways for our relationship with nature to be used in treating mental health, improving contact with nature in cities, and reevaluating the quality of everyday modern life.