Being Outside Is Good For Your Health

In response to our recent story about the health benefits of spending time in nature, readers wanted to know: What type of nature counts?

The bottom line

Lots of studies indicate it is good for you to spend time in the woods. But what about the beach? The garden? On a motorcycle? What about a golf course? What if you don’t walk the golf course but ride in a cart? What if you’re having a really frustrating game?

Though hundreds of studies convincingly suggest that spending time in nature is good for health and longevity, scientists still don’t know exactly why. “What really is it about ‘nature’ that makes us healthier? We can’t nail it down to one thing that is true for all people,” says Christopher Minson, a University of Oregon physiology professor and chief science officer of NatureQuant, a startup working on an app for users to track the time they spend in nature.

Take golf courses, for instance. Those count as nature because they are green space. Numerous studies have associated golf with improved health. But is that because of the exercise or the nature? “No research I’m aware of has directly investigated whether the health benefits to being on a golf course can be attributed to nature itself,” Dr. Minson says.

The details

Beach time? It is good for your physical and mental health, according to a growing body of research. Adults in England who live in coastal areas “tend to be happier and healthier than similar individuals inland,” according to a study published in the journal Environment International in 2019. That may be partly because they were more physically active. They took more walks. The difference in onland physical activity between those living less than 5 kilometres—or a little over 3 miles—from the coast and those living more than 50 kilometres was equal to cycling 14 to 40 minutes a week at 15km an hour, the researchers found.

That wasn’t the only reason, though, according to the study. People living inland near “blue spaces”—rivers and lakes—also reported greater health and happiness that wasn’t associated with physical activity.

No, you don’t have to be exercising to reap the benefits of nature.

The practice the Japanese call “forest bathing” is strongly linked to lower blood pressure, heart rate and stress hormones and decreased anxiety, depression and fatigue. It also is linked to decreased inflammation. Many scientists believe the benefits aren’t due just to clean air and less noise, but the substances released from trees, plants and soil. Those include organic compounds, pollen, fungi and bacteria that contribute to the diversity of microorganisms humans need for a robust and diverse microbiome—all the tiny living things on us and in us that protect us from disease. So just breathing the fresh forest air may help strengthen our immune systems, according to a review published in February in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

The benefits don’t just occur in forests. Scientists define nature as all sorts of environments dominated by living material, from a small urban park to the wilderness, according to research. Their definition of “nature exposure” ranges from plants in a room to camping trips to virtual reality.

That means you are likely to get some nature benefits from gardening, kayaking or even on a motorcycle, assuming it’s out in the country, says Dr. Minson. A lot more research is needed to know just how much.

The Apple growth and profit machine is wavering, and the boost from price increases might not be enough to keep it going at historic rates. That dials up the pressure on Apple’s new chief executive, John Ternus.

The company saved the bad news for its earnings call, an hour after it posted its results for the September quarter, projecting that for the current quarter its high-margin services business will continue to slow and that its widely watched gross profit margin will continue to fall.

Apple AAPL -1.83%decrease; down pointing triangle shares had been flat in post-close trading but declined as much as 4% after the company made the projections, which fell short of Wall Street estimates.

The impact of high memory costs are weighing even more heavily on the company, Ternus and Apple Chief Financial Officer Kevan Parekh said on the company’s earnings call. Apple has stockpiled cheaper components purchased earlier, but those inventories are dwindling.

When Ternus took over as Apple’s third chief executive of the past 29 years on Sept. 1, he inherited sky-high expectations. The men he followed were among the most successful company leaders in American business history. Steve Jobs revolutionized consumer devices multiple times. Tim Cook expanded Jobs’s creation to spectacular heights.

The expectations are reflected in Apple’s huge valuation. Oppenheimer analyst Martin Yang noted that Apple stock trades at 36 times next year’s expected earnings, a premium to the overall market, even though its earnings are only expected to grow 1%, which is slower than its tech peers.

“We see insufficient upside to justify the premium,” Yang wrote in an investor note, adding that Apple needs to boost iPhone sales growth and turn around its slowing services business to make him more bullish.

Investors have bid up Apple shares because it has been a port in the AI storm—a reliable and capital-efficient business that stands apart from rivals which are spending hundreds of billions of dollars racing to the AI frontier.

While others invest in data centers, Apple has been pouring its own cash into buybacks and dividends. But that safety may be challenged if Ternus can’t speed up Apple’s innovation engine.

Apple’s lagging performance in AI was evident when its new “Siri AI” chatbot arrived this past quarter. Its long-maligned assistant was already stale the day it arrived, surpassed by agents such as Instinct and Muse that can complete multistep tasks for consumers, while Siri still sets kitchen timers.

Apple needs to give people reasons to buy its devices as they get more expensive. The company raised prices across the board last quarter to help offset higher costs. Without compelling new features, a big question is whether consumers will slow the frequency of iPhone upgrades.

The new iPhone Duo appears to be a bright spot. Consumers are scooping up the $1,999 foldable smartphone despite mixed reviews—so many that Apple can’t keep up with demand. Shipping dates jumped out to January soon after the device went on sale, a disappointment for the normally reliable Apple supply chain.

Apple said its revenue grew 12% in the September quarter, slightly ahead of Wall Street’s expectations. Its widely tracked gross profit margin, at 47.9%, also came in just ahead of analyst estimates.

Apple will need to find new growth avenues because a reliable engine during the Cook era—the services business—is slowing. Courts and regulators worldwide have limited Apple’s ability to charge developers big fees to distribute apps through its App Store, the biggest component of the company’s services segment.

One of its most lucrative App Store fee generators has been the ChatGPT app from OpenAI. Around the time Apple accused OpenAI of trade-secret theft this past summer, OpenAI began redirecting potential subscribers to pay via its website instead of the App Store, skirting Apple’s tollbooth.

Apple’s valuation has bumped up against a ceiling in recent weeks. Six times it traded above a $5 trillion market capitalization intraday before finally closing above the threshold, which it has already fallen back below.

News Corp, owner of The Wall Street Journal, has a commercial agreement to supply news through Apple services.

Being Outside Is Good For Your Health—But Does Golf Count?

There are many health benefits of spending time in nature—but what exactly does that mean?

The bottom line

The details

Apple’s growth engine is showing signs of slowing, as rising costs, weaker services growth and AI competition challenge its profitability. With John Ternus taking the helm, the pressure is on to reignite innovation and sustain investor confidence.