Effects of micro-landscapes on attention restoration in older adults within community public spaces

Urban green spaces provide nature-like psychological restorative benefits. However, limited by mobility constraints and spatial accessibility, older adults struggle to fully utilize the restorative effects of large-scale landscapes. As an intensive landscape carrier, whether micro-landscapes can achieve nature-like psychological restorative benefits still requires empirical verification. Using eye-tracking combined with the Perceived Restorativeness Scale (PRS), this study adopted a repeated-measures ANOVA design, with different types of community public spaces (Nodal spaces/Path spaces/District spaces) and the presence/absence of micro-landscapes as independent variables, to explore the effects of micro-landscapes on attention restoration of older adults in community public spaces. The results showed that micro-landscapes significantly induced psychophysiological restoration effects similar to those of natural environments, with particularly significant performance in the Fascination dimension. Different types of community public spaces also had a significant impact on eye movement-related indices and interacted with micro-landscapes, among which micro-landscapes showed the best attention restoration benefits in “District spaces”. Considering the impact of micro-landscapes and community public spaces on the psychophysiological health of older adults, this finding may provide new protection and planning strategies for urban greening therapeutic design and the field of age-friendly community spaces.