Focus on the Environment
Psychological science has been criticised for a blinkered focus on the individual while ignoring wider, systemic issues issues \cite{Carlisle_2009,Frawley_2015}. Critics have argued that the construct of wellbeing is a socio-cultural construction of western individualism that places importance on wealth, fame and materialistic pursuits, while neglecting neglecting our shared environment \cite{Carlisle_2009}. These criticisms in combination with an ever-increasing body of peer-reviewed literature on ‘happiness’ and ‘wellbeing’ were, in part, reason for proposing our original GENIAL framework \cite{Kemp_2017}, which extended theoretical frameworks of individual wellbeing to community wellbeing. Here we focus on contributions from the wider environment to individual wellbeing, and implications for tackling greatest societal facing mankind: the climate. We use the term ‘environment’ in a very general sense, encompassing natural as well as human-built environments, although we place emphasis on the relationship between individual wellbeing and the natural environment given the sheer scale of the challenge associated with the climate crisis.
It is now accepted in scientific circles \cite{change2007,change2014} that humanity will face catastrophic climate change should we fail to commit to climate action. An increase in the frequency, duration and intensity of extreme weather events increases risk of population distress and psychiatric disorders through disruption to food supply and damage to community wellbeing \cite{Berry_2009,Hayes_2018}. Extreme weather events have even been shown to influence the future health and wellbeing of an unborn child with implications for brain development and metabolic outcomes \cite{Dancause_2015,Dufoix_2015}. Other research has also shown that climate change has increased global economic inequality by ~25% over the last 50 years, with wealthy countries benefiting disproportionally \cite{Diffenbaugh_2019}. Rising inequality has been linked to the middle-class squeeze, intergenerational immobility, erosion of trust, more divided societies, rising populism, poverty, crime, ill-health and ill-being. Interested readers are referred to the excellent recent review by Brian Nolan and Luis Alenzuela \cite{Nolan_2019}. Critically, ratings of peer-reviewed climate-science and self-ratings by climate change scientists themselves has indicated that there is 97% endorsement that humans are contributing to the warming climate (i.e. anthropogenic climate change) \cite{Cook_2013,Cook_2016}. Unfortunately, this finding remains under appreciated in a brave new world of alternative facts and disinformation \cite{Lewandowsky_2013,Lewandowsky_2017}.
Human beings have a strong, innate affiliation with the biological world, a phenomenon captured by the ‘biophilia hypothesis’. Recent research indicates that people who spend at least two hours a week in nature are more likely to report good health and high levels of wellbeing than those who spent no time in nature \cite{White_2019}. Furthermore, these findings were consistent across a variety of demographic variables including sex, age-group, occupational social grade, presence of chronic illness and whether or not individuals met physical activity guidelines. Prior research had indicated that spending time in nature over a two-week period boosts hedonic as well as eudaimonic wellbeing \cite{howell2014}, and that effect sizes are larger (ds from .37 to .63) than those reported for other positive psychology interventions (ds from .20 to .34) \cite{Bolier_2013}. Exposure to nature can lead to transcendent emotions \cite{Bethelmy_2019}, peak experience \cite{1964} and psychological flow \cite{Csikszentmihalyi_2014}. Interestingly, transcendent emotions - including compassion, gratitude and awe - foster healthy social relationships \cite{Stellar_2017} and such relationships are facilitated by spending time in nature \cite{Mayer_2008,Richardson_2016}. Research also reports that exposure to nature is associated with stress reduction \cite{Hansmann_2007,Ulrich_1991}, feelings of restoration \cite{White_2013,Wyles_2017}, subjective wellbeing \cite{Johansson_2011,LUCK_2011,White_2017}, and improved cognitive functioning \cite{Berman_2008,Berto_2005}. Human beings also have a strong affiliation with the local environment (‘place’), driven by cultural experience \cite{Beery_2015,s2012}. This is known as the 'topophilia hypothesis'; the word topophilia combines topos (place) with philia (love). The biophilia and topophilia hypotheses provide a foundation on which to understand the distress, pain or sickness associated with environmental degradation of home or territory. Glenn \citet{albrecht2019}, an Australian environmental philosopher coined the term ‘solastalgia’ after reflecting on the environmental impacts of open cut coal mining and pollution of local power stations on the residents of the Upper Hunter Region of NSW in Australia. He wrote that ‘solastalgia’ reflects a: 
“specific form of melancholia connected to a lack of solace and intense desolation” associated with place-based distress \cite{albrecht2005a}
Feelings of guilt, shame, fear, emotional discomfort and solastalgia have been associated with motivation to engage in environmental sustainability behaviours \citep{Albrecht_2007,DICKERSON_1992,Kaiser_2008,Malott_2010}. In order to encourage such behaviours, scholars have proposed an ‘aesthetics of elsewhere’, which involves encouraging a double aesthetic judgment of ‘here’ and ‘elsewhere’ to induce an aesthetic melancholia to influence consumption decisions \cite{maskit2011}. However, researchers have also begun to investigate the value of positive psychology in encouraging pro-environmental behaviours. Positive psychology refers to the scientific study of human flourishing and an applied approach to enabling individuals, communities and organisations to thrive  \citep{Gable_2005}\citep{Sheldon_2001}.  The positive psychology of sustainability \cite{Corral_Verdugo_2014,Corral_Verdugo_2012,obrien2016} is a strategy that may help to foster what has been described as sustainable wellbeing \cite{Kjell_2011}. In a study on 606 undergraduate students in Mexico \cite{fraijo-sing2011}, researchers reported that pro-ecological, altruistic, frugal and equitable behaviours reflect the sustainably-oriented person, and that these behaviours have positive psychological consequences (i.e. greater happiness). A major goal of positive psychology should now be focused on developing interventions that promote such behaviours, an effort that would have substantial benefits for the wellbeing of current and future of generations. In this regard, prior research has shown that individuals engaging in pro-ecological behaviours – such as resource conservation – report greater happiness \cite{Brown_2005}, that altruism leads to greater long-term happiness \cite{ja1995}, and that frugality predicts greater psychological wellbeing, satisfaction and motivation \cite{Brown_2005}. Notably however, equitable individuals have been reported to be less happy due to the ‘negative hedonic impact of inequality in society’ as climate change exacerbates existing inequities \cite{Hayes_2018}, highlighting a need for sociostructural reforms. Indeed, in their review of inequality and its discontents, \citet*{Nolan_2019} concluded that we now have a window of opportunity for designing and implementing sociostructural changes through strategies and policies to halt and reverse rising income and wealth inequality.
The grave threat of anthropogenic climate change (refers to the production of greenhouse gases emitted by human activity), may help to inspire a variety of positive feelings such as altruism, compassion, optimism as well as a sense of purpose “as people band together to salvage, rebuild, and console amongst the chaos and loss of a changing climate” \cite{Hayes_2018}, feelings that reflect ‘active hope’ \cite{c2012}. The concept of ‘sustainable happiness’ \cite{2016} has been defined as “happiness that contributes to individual, community, and/or global well-being without exploiting other people, the environment, or future generations”\cite{obrien2010}
A central concept within the field of Positive Psychology is that of 'character strengths'. In their book 'Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification', \citet{p2004} describes a framework for the identification of individual cognitive,  emotional, social and community strengths, protective strengths, and spiritual strengths. In total \citet{p2004} describe 24 character strengths which individuals possess to more or less of a degree. A structural model of the relationships between character strengths, virtues and sustainable behaviours (i.e. altruistic, frugal, equitable and pro-ecological behaviours) has been presented such that all 24 character strengths are associated with all four sustainable behaviours \cite{Corral_Verdugo_2015}. The knowledge that pro-environmental behaviours provide opportunities to promote happiness and build resources for resilience, in addition to much-needed environmental benefits provides a useful foundation on which psychological scientists could address environmental challenges through targeted interventions focusing on the individual \cite{Clayton_2016,fraijo-sing2011,Corral_Verdugo_2012}. Recommendations included the need for psychological scientists to incorporate a contextualised or 'place-based' approach - including aspects of the built environment and different cultures - into initiatives designed to facilitate pro-environmental behaviours and to engage in more interdisciplinary research.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of people do not engage in pro-environmental behaviours, a result of helplessness and low self-efficacy \cite{Salomon_2017}. The difficulty in comprehending problems associated with climate change, and the intangibility and invisibility of such change may lead individuals to 'sit on their hands and do nothing', a phenomenon known as ‘Giddens Paradox’ \cite{a2009}. Recent qualitative research \cite{langen2017} has investigated the psychological processes that foster pro-environmental behaviours. Findings were interpreted in the context of ‘salutogenesis’ \cite{ANTONOVSKY_1996}, which emphasises a role for a ‘sense of coherence’ for managing and overcoming stress. This ‘sense of coherence’ reflect feelings of confidence that stimuli in the (internal and external) environment are comprehensible, manageable and meaningful. The researchers reported that grassroots activists relied on values and attitudes, emphasising that the problems are so vast that limits are imposed on knowledge (i.e. comprehensibility), arguing that emotions are a key mediator between the appraisal of a situation and motivation to take action. A sense of personal responsibility for change was associated with an improved perceived quality of life, attributable to empowerment and social cohesion, which provides a sense of meaning and purpose in life. Concrete and collective action was also observed to enhance positive emotions and mastery experiences subsequently enhancing beliefs about self-efficacy (i.e. manageability) \cite{langen2017}.
In summary, we have observed emerging research interest in the concepts of sustainable happiness and wellbeing, directly linking positive psychology to concepts relating to sustainability and pro-environmental behaviours. Although much work remains to be done, these efforts serve to combat criticisms of psychological science relating to a blinkered focus on personal happiness that ignores important societal challenges. Spending time in and caring for for the natural environment may provide an under-appreciated means to promote  wellbeing that is over and above the beneficial impacts of outdoor physical activity \cite{Franco_2017,Capaldi_2015,Bowler_2010} and may even promote commitment to pro-environmental behaviours, serving to support efforts to combat the climate crisis. 

The Updated GENIAL model: GENIAL 2.0

”Models, of course, are never true, but fortunately it is only necessary that they be useful”.
– George Box, 1979, Journal of the American Statistical Association, 74:365, 1-4
The GENIAL framework illustrates common pathways to ill-health and ill-being versus health and wellbeing. The evidence-base for these pathways - including a key regulatory role for vagal function - have been described previously \cite{Kemp_2017,Kemp2017,ah2018}. While our original GENIAL model highlighted the importance of positive social ties for individual health and wellbeing \cite{Kemp_2017}, our updated model (see Fig \ref{div-162276})  provides an important update to our original GENIAL model, emphasising individual, community and environmental contributors to personal wellbeing. In doing so, our model characterises the relationships between individuals, communities and their environments, as well as the impacts of sociostructural factors (e.g. inequality) and their impact on the health and wellbeing of the individual. Key features of the individual, community and environmental domains are now briefly described with a particular focus on vagal function.
Our original GENIAL and NIACT models suggest that enhancing positive psychological experiences and positive health behaviours can facilitate individual pathways to health and wellbeing (Kemp, Arias, & Fisher, 2017a; Kemp, Koenig, & Thayer, 2017b). In terms of enhancing psychological experiences, broadly speaking, there have been two approaches; the reduction of impairment or the promotion of wellbeing. Historically psychological interventions have typically been weighted towards interventions that seek to reduce impairment (Ryff and Singer, 1996). This approach assumes that health and wellbeing are synonymous with the absence of illness, as opposed to the presence of wellness. However, Ryff and Singer, (1996) suggest that the 'absence of wellbeing' facilitates pathways to ill-health and ill-being and they argue that the route to recovery will not come from only attempting to ameliorating negative symptoms associated with ill-health. We also advocate interventions that create a platform for the experience of ‘positive psychological experiences’ because environments that promote positive emotions may help people learn to better short circuit downward spirals to illness.  In this regard, interventions from the feld of Positive Psychology field of Positive Psychology have much to offer. Meta-analyses have demonstrated that positive psychological interventions (PPIs) are effective for people with or without diagnosed disorders \cite{Bolier_2013,Hendriks_2019,Chakhssi_2018,Sin_2009,White_2019a}, with effect sizes ranging from small to large. Meta-analyses have further demonstrated the effectiveness of specific positive psychological interventions (PPIs) on increasing SWB, PWB, optimism, positive affect and life satisfaction, including the practicing of gratitude \cite{Davis_2016}, the ‘best possible self’ intervention \cite{Malouff_2016}, savouring positive emotions \cite{Smith_2014}, mindfulness-based interventions \citep{Simpson_2019}, and performing acts of kindness \cite{Curry_2018}. The three main models of wellbeing \cite{Seligman_2018,Diener_1984,Ryff_1995} provide a theoretical foundation for developing new and novel interventions for enhancing positive psychological experience. Importantly, research demonstrates that despite the different theories that have been proposed for wellbeing, each of these contributes to the same higher order construct of wellbeing \cite{Goodman_2017,Disabato_2016}. In other words, there are many strategies through which positive psychological experience may be enhanced.
Other meta-analyses on health behaviours have emphasised the role of physical activity \cite{Chekroud2018}, diet \cite{Firth_2019} and sleep \cite{Baglioni_2016} on our mental lives. Our recent review on vagal function \cite{Kemp_2017a} concluded that higher resting state vagal function is associated with positive mood states, highlighting the utility of positive psychology interventions for enhancing a critical regulator of health and wellbeing. Our work further emphasises the structural link between the vagus nerve, and physical and mental health \cite{Kemp_2017,Kemp2017,ah2018,Kemp_2013,Kemp_2016a}. It is interesting to note here that purpose in life has been shown to predict allostatic load ten years later \cite{Zilioli_2015} as measured by the sum of seven scores across multiple physiological systems including cardiovascular, lipid, glucose metabolism, inflammation, autonomic function, and hypothalmic-pituitary-adrenal risk scores. Unfortunately however, this study did not distinguish between upstream and downstream systems driving increases in metabolic risk. as we do here. Critically, vagal function plays a known regulatory role over inflammatory processes, as demonstrated previously: \citealt{Tracey_2002}
In addition to focusing on positive psychological experience and health behaviours, recent developments in psychological science have highlighted a key role for social relationships for the health and wellbeing of the individual. Therefore, individual wellbeing may also be promoted by focusing on community, the focus of our original GENIAL model \cite{Kemp_2017}. The implications of social relationships for the health and wellbeing of the individual were recently summarised by \citet{2018}\citet{Haslam_2016} evaluated a new intervention that targets social isolation and disconnection, "Groups 4 Health" (G4H). Results highlighted the intervention to improve mental health, wellbeing, and social connectedness up to 6-months post intervention. In addition to this, improvements in depression, anxiety, stress, loneliness, and life satisfaction correlated with heightened identification with the G4H group and with multiple groups. The work by Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues is also relevant here, emphasising the upward spiral of positive emotions, social connectedness and vagal function \cite{Kok_2010,Kok_2013}. Other well established theories of vagal function, such as the polyvagal theory \citep{Porges:2011wv,PORGES_1995,Porges_2001,Porges_2003,Porges_2007} highlight a role for the vagus in promoting capacity to engage with others and regulating our emotions during such encounters. 
Finally, our updated model emphasises the environmental context within which individual health and wellbeing is promoted and communities reside. Glenn \citet{albrecht2019} provides a solid foundation for understanding the link between human emotion and the environment, coining numerous words to emphasise the negative and positive 'psychoterratic' states that have important implications for the health and wellbeing of individuals, communities and nations now and into the future. Environmental contributors include negative and positive psychoterratic states such as solastalgia (chronic place-based distress) and soliphila (a neutral political term for combatting solastalgia) \cite{albrecht2019}. A review of the literature on potential mechanisms linking nature to health identified 21 potential pathways empirically linked to nature \cite{Kuo_2015}. These pathways included environmental factors including phytoncides - antimicrobial volatile organic compounds with physiological effects - and vegetation filtering of pollutants, physiological factors such as elevation of vagal function and immune function, psychological factors involving positive emotions and attention restoration, and behavioural factors including positive health behaviours such as the promotion of physical activity and social ties. Interestingly, this paper suggested that enhanced immune functioning might reflect a central pathway for mediating the beneficial effects of nature on health. It is apparent however, that vagal function plays a regulatory role over immune function via the cholinergic anti-inflammatory response \citep{Pavlov_2003}.  Other research has shown that vagal function may be facilitated by spending time in nature. For instance, a recent review of the literature \cite{Kondo_2018} on the impacts of spending time outdoors on stress reported that of 17 studies reporting on measures of HRV, 14 reported significant findings. Measures of the high frequency (HF) component - a commonly reported measure of vagal function - increased for participants spending time outdoors. It is relevant to note here that measures of HF HRV are generally negatively correlated with with meaures of heart rate. That is, high levels of vagal function  - as is typically indexed by HF HRV - are associated with a low heart rate. Thus, it is against this background of findings that we suggest that vagal function both affects and are affected by the effects of psychological experience, health behaviours, social ties, as well as the environment.
In conclusion, our updated GENIAL model (fig \ref{div-162276}) summarises individual, community and environmental contributors to human health and wellbeing. Our model also characterises the major targets for potentially improving wellbeing in people including those living with chronic conditions and disorders. Targets include psychological experience, health behaviour, social connections and outdoor nature-based activities to which the tools from positive psychology and behaviour change may be applied.