Healing Environments For Children Who Have Experienced Trauma

The summary includes evidence from a range of literature, including mental health and architecture. This review pulls together the relatively sparse evidence about children's home design, and combines it with selected articles from health and architecture, in order to illustrate the potential components of a healing home.

Key findings

This evidence review found that there is very little evidence exploring how a healing environment may improve outcomes for children who have experienced trauma. Some promising case studies show that the design, colour and appearance of a residential child care space can help to create and sustain a warm, happy and nurturing environment (Rice et al. 2011). Others suggest that both the architecture and interior design of a children's space can have an impact on relationships and can help or hinder social interaction (Docherty et al. 2006), which may be vital for creating healthy attachments.