Screening visual environment impact factors and the restorative effect of four visual environment components in large-space alternative care facilities

Alternative care facilities (ACFs) based on large-space public buildings were widely used early at the start of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. However, studies have shown that the indoor spatial environment of ACFs can significantly induce mental health problems among users. Thus, this study hypothesizes that improving the visual environment in the interiors of large-space ACFs may reduce mental health problems among users. To verify this hypothesis, this study used critical analysis to screen the influencing factors and used analytic hierarchy process analysis to determine the weights. Particularly, the analyses were based on ACF research in Wuhan and questionnaire surveys of patients with experience using ACFs. Subsequently, virtual reality experiments were conducted to measure physiological indicators and subjective questionnaire collection based on the orthogonal experimental design of the four screened visual environment components. The results revealed the following related to large-space ACFs: 1) Lifestyle support was the most dominant patient requirement and preference for the visual environment. 2) The visual environment can influence the participants' efficiency of psychological stress relief, emotional regulation, and subjective perception. 3) Different design characteristics of the four visual environment components were causally related to restorative effects. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study analyzing patients' preferences and psychological needs for the visual environment of large-space ACFs and combining subjective and objective measures to investigate the restorative effects of the visual environment. Improving the quality of the visual environment in large-space ACFs presents an effective intervention for alleviating the psychological problems of admitted patients. •The importance and weights of the impact factors of the visual environment of the large-space alternative care facility on patients' psychological state were determined by importance analysis and AHP hierarchical analysis.•Combined with physiological indicators and subjective evaluation questionnaires, the subjects' psychological stress relief, emotional regulation and subjective perception optimization in different VR scenes were measured.•The correlation between different design characteristics of four important visual environment components and restorative effects was revealed.