Green and blue settings as providers of mental health ecosystem services: Comparing urban beaches and parks and building a predictive model of psychological restoration

•Users of urban parks and beaches differed in age, patterns and frequency of use.•Sampled beaches and parks elicited moderate to large experiences of restoration in their users.•Physical/design features were limitedly associated to psychological restoration.•Place attachment and place identification were the greatest predictors of restoration. Urban beaches and parks are providers of numerous ecosystem services. In the cultural sphere, place bonding and psychological restoration might significantly contribute to the health and well-being of citizens. In this manuscript, we present a study aimed to evaluate the extent to which three urban beaches and three urban parks offered these advantages to a sample of users (n = 429) in the city of Donostia-San Sebastián (Spain). A second aim was to build a predictive model of restoration through both objective and subjective measures. We assessed the design and physical features of the settings using the Natural Environment Scoring Tool (NEST) and gathered a range of information about the users via a paper & pencil questionnaire. The survey included socio-demographics, questions regarding the frequency and patterns of use, and four different psycho-environmental scales: Perceived Restorativeness Scale (PRS), Place Attachment and Identification Scale, and Restoration Outcome Scales (ROS). We found differences regarding the profile of users and the activities carried out in each of the settings. Users of beaches reported higher levels of attachment, identification, and experienced restoration than the participants surveyed in urban parks (p