fNIRS, Neurourbanism and Body-Territory: How Walkable Environments Modulate the Prefrontal Cortex

A BrainLatam2026 reading on NIRS/fNIRS, city, APUS, Jiwasa, Zone 2 and evidence-based urban planning

Before talking about the city, we need to talk about the body.

The city is not only scenery.
The street is not only passage.
The sidewalk is not only infrastructure.

When we walk through a tree-lined street, with varied façades, human scale, low traffic and places to stay, the body breathes in one way. When we walk through a monotonous, noisy street, without greenery, with heavy traffic and poor spatial quality, the body organizes itself in another way.

The city enters the body.
And the body responds to the city.

That is why the publication “Pleasant walking environments enhance emotional experiences and reduce brain activation — an application of fNIRS in urban studies”, by Lisa Marie Brunner, Pasi Aalto, Helge Hillnhütter, Christian A. Klöckner, Martin Steinert and Henrikke Dybvik, published in Cities in 2026, is so important for BrainLatam2026.

The article investigates how different walkable urban environments affect emotional experiences and brain activation in the prefrontal cortex, using fNIRS — functional near-infrared spectroscopy.

The central question of the study can be stated as:

How do different urban walking environments influence measurable emotional experiences and cognitive responses in the prefrontal cortex?

This question is powerful because it takes urban planning beyond the merely visual, aesthetic or functional field and places it also in the neurophysiological field. The city stops being only something we look at. It becomes something the body must process, regulate and tolerate.

What the article investigated

The study included 51 participants, who watched videos of four real walking environments. These environments represented different urban qualities:

a mixed-use residential area;
a mixed-use old town street;
a monotonous residential street;
a city centre environment.

The videos were recorded in Copenhagen from a pedestrian perspective, at a typical walking speed of 4 to 5 km/h. To create stimuli closer to real experience, the authors used dynamic videos instead of only static images. Even so, the experiment was conducted in a controlled environment: participants were seated while watching the videos.

During the visual exposure, the researchers measured changes in oxygenated and deoxygenated haemoglobin in the prefrontal cortex using fNIRS, while also collecting subjective ratings of emotional experience: pleasantness, stress, excitement, relaxation, boredom and complexity.

The results pointed in a very interesting direction: walking environments perceived as more pleasant reduced activation in the prefrontal cortex, while environments perceived as less pleasant increased brain activation in prefrontal regions.

The authors’ interpretation is careful: more pleasant environments appear to be associated with lower cognitive demand, greater physiological relaxation and more positive emotional experiences. Less pleasant environments seem to require more processing, attention and cognitive effort, potentially producing more stressful or unpleasant experiences.

This finding is important because it shows that different built urban scenes — not only the opposition between “nature” and “city” — can produce measurable differences in brain activity.

Recognition of the scientific question and experimental design

The merit of this article is considerable.

The researchers transformed an urban question into a neuroscientific question without losing the connection with architecture, mobility, health and well-being. This requires a rare interdisciplinary vision: bringing together urban planning, environmental psychology, neuroscience, fNIRS, experimental design and emotional assessment.

The question is excellent because it emerges from a real problem: if we want healthier, more walkable and more human cities, we need to understand how different environments affect people’s bodies and minds.

The experimental design also deserves recognition. Using real walking videos, assessed by experts through urban indicators, and combining them with subjective measures and fNIRS recordings in the prefrontal cortex is a relevant contribution to neurourbanism.

The article does not promise more than it can deliver. It recognizes its limitations, but it opens an important path: using neuroscientific methods to qualify decisions in urban design, architecture and public policy.

Equipment, sensors and technical architecture used in the study

This article is also important for laboratories because it describes the technical architecture used for data collection.

For fNIRS, the authors used a system from NIRx Medical Technologies, with an 8 × 8 configuration and short channels, positioned to measure prefrontal cortex activity during the visual exposure to urban walking environments.

The optodes were placed over the prefrontal cortex, covering regions associated with emotional evaluation, cognitive demand, attention and environmental processing. This is especially relevant because fNIRS is well suited for measuring cortical haemodynamic responses in superficial brain regions such as the PFC.

The walking videos were recorded with a DJI Pocket 2 camera, mounted on a 3-axis stabilized gimbal, in 4K resolution, from a pedestrian perspective. This technical choice matters because the visual stimulus needed to preserve a smooth, realistic walking experience without introducing unnecessary visual instability.

The experimental presentation and survey collection were conducted using PsychoPy, and the fNIRS data were analyzed with the NIRS Brain AnalyzIR Toolbox in MATLAB. The authors also assessed signal quality using metrics such as Scalp Coupling Index and Peak Spectral Power.

This level of description is very valuable. It shows that a good experimental design does not depend only on the scientific question, but also on the compatibility between question, equipment, optode montage, short channels, visual stimulus quality, synchronization, software and signal analysis.

For Brain Support and BrainLatam, this point is strategic: when we talk about implementing NIRS/fNIRS in academic research, we are not talking only about equipment. We are talking about experimental design, scientific questions, montage, software, signal processing and real-world application.

fNIRS, prefrontal cortex and urban experience

The prefrontal cortex is important for attention, cognitive control, emotional evaluation, decision-making and regulation in response to the environment.

When an urban environment demands more effort, the PFC may show greater activation. This does not automatically mean something “good” or “bad,” but it may indicate greater cognitive demand, greater attentional requirement or greater effort to handle the scene.

In the study, lower-quality urban environments — more monotonous, with heavier traffic, less spatial variation and fewer pleasant elements — tended to increase prefrontal activation. More pleasant environments — with mixed use, varied façades, greenery, lower traffic and better spatial quality — tended to reduce this activation.

From the BrainLatam2026 perspective, this speaks directly to the idea of Zone 1, Zone 2 and Zone 3.

A city that demands constant vigilance, tense displacement, fear, noise, monotony and disorientation pushes the body toward more defensive states. The person walks, but does not enjoy. The person crosses the space, but does not belong. The person moves, but does not rest.

A walkable, varied, safe, green and humanly proportioned city can favor something closer to Zone 2: less tension, greater sensory openness, more enjoyment, more metacognition and more availability to perceive the other.

The street, then, stops being only “public space.”
It becomes a regulator of the body.

APUS and Body-Territory: the city as extended proprioception

This article speaks deeply to APUS, understood as body-territory and extended proprioception.

When we walk, the body is not isolated inside the skin. The sidewalk, the façade, the noise, the greenery, the bench, the shade, the flow of cars, the rhythm of other pedestrians and the width of the street enter bodily experience.

The body calculates distance.
The body perceives risk.
The body feels openness.
The body recognizes shelter.
The body evaluates whether it can stay or must escape.

This is APUS: the territory participating in the organization of the body.

An unpleasant city can narrow APUS. The person becomes more contracted, faster, more defensive, more captured by the task of crossing. A pleasant city can expand APUS. The person can walk, look, breathe, meet, rest, talk and belong.

The study by Brunner and colleagues offers neuroscientific materiality for this intuition: different urban environments are not only aesthetic preferences. They can modulate brain activation associated with emotional and cognitive experience.

Jiwasa and neurourbanism: the city that allows “we”

Neurourbanism should not be only a science of efficient cities. It can become a science of cities that allow Jiwasa.

Jiwasa appears when the territory allows the “I” not to remain in constant defense. A good sidewalk, a pleasant street, a living square, a human façade, a tree, a bench and a safe pedestrian flow are not decorative details. They participate in the creation of a collective perception of care.

The city can say to the body:

you may pass;
you may stay;
you may breathe;
you may meet;
you may belong.

When the article shows that more pleasant walkable environments reduce prefrontal activation and improve emotional experience, it helps us think that urban quality participates in collective regulation.

A bad city increases cognitive cost.
A good city distributes care.
An excellent city creates belonging.

From the article’s question to a BrainLatam2026 experimental design

The article asked:

How do different walkable urban environments influence emotional experiences and prefrontal activation measured by fNIRS?

To answer this, the authors measured:

subjective emotional responses and HbO/HbR changes in the prefrontal cortex while participants watched videos of four real walking environments.

With this, the study showed:

that environments perceived as pleasant tend to reduce prefrontal activation and improve emotional experience, while less pleasant environments tend to increase prefrontal activation and worsen subjective experience.

From this contribution, BrainLatam2026 can ask:

How does the real experience of walking through different Latin American urban territories modulate body, brain, breathing, attention, belonging and sense of safety?

This question would require a more embodied experimental design, combining:

mobile fNIRS/NIRS + eye-tracking + GSR + respiration + ECG/HRV/RMSSD + accelerometry + GPS + real-time subjective assessment.

Mobile fNIRS would be essential to measure prefrontal responses during real walking or immersive virtual reality.
Eye-tracking would show where the pedestrian looks: façades, cars, trees, people, signs, holes, sidewalk, horizon.
GSR would help capture sympathetic activation, alertness and emotional salience.
Respiration would show whether the body opens, holds, accelerates or regulates.
ECG and HRV/RMSSD would allow assessment of autonomic regulation and bodily safety.
Accelerometry and GPS would connect body movement, walking rhythm and territory.
Subjective assessment would record pleasure, stress, fear, boredom, belonging and desire to stay.

If the question involves groups walking together, we could include Hyperscanning with fNIRS or EEG, investigating whether different urban environments increase or reduce social synchrony, leadership, proximity and Jiwasa.

Once again, technology emerges from the question.

We do not use fNIRS because it is modern.
We use fNIRS because we want to understand how the city enters the body and how the body responds to the city.

Limits of the study and decolonial expansion

The article recognizes an important limitation: participants were seated while watching videos. This allows greater experimental control and reduces noise, but it does not fully reproduce the real experience of walking.

Walking involves rhythmic movement, proprioception, sounds, smells, temperature, encounters, memories, fear, urgency, familiarity and purpose. Walking to work is not the same as walking for leisure. Walking in Copenhagen is not the same as walking in São Paulo, Joinville, Cianorte, Bogotá, Lima, Mexico City, Santiago or Manaus.

This is where the generous decolonial critique enters.

The study is excellent and opens a promising methodology. But the next question needs to include Latin American contexts, urban inequality, fear, broken sidewalks, lack of shade, public transportation, peripheries, historic centers, favelas, planned neighborhoods, commercial streets, symbolic violence, gender, age, disability and belonging.

The experience of walking is not universal.

A woman walking at night may have a PFC in a state of vigilance.
An older person crossing a street with insufficient traffic-light time may experience bodily tension.
A child walking to school may learn belonging or fear.
A person with a disability may experience the city as opening or blockage.
A worker crossing a hostile avenue may spend cognitive energy before even arriving at work.

Decolonial neurourbanism is not only about measuring the brain in the city.
It is about asking what kind of city steals or returns vital energy to the social body.

Bridge with DREX Cidadão and public policy

The connection with DREX Cidadão appears when we understand the city as metabolism.

A walkable city reduces defensive expenditure.
A green city reduces tension.
A city with good sidewalks expands autonomy.
A city with places to stay favors belonging.
A city that protects pedestrians improves public health.

But this requires investment, planning and political decision.

DREX Cidadão can be understood, within this lens, as a civic technology of social metabolism: money as minimum energy distributed to the social body, allowing people to have time, presence and material conditions to live the city, not only survive in it.

If the city is built only for cars, consumption and real estate value, it pushes many bodies toward Zone 3. If the city is built for walking, encounter, shade, safety, education and health, it can favor collective Zone 2.

The article shows that urban environments modulate emotional experience and prefrontal activity. BrainLatam2026 expands the question: what public policies allow entire neighborhoods to become environments of regulation, belonging and health?

Closing

The publication by Brunner and colleagues reminds us that the city does not end in asphalt.

It enters the eyes.
It enters breathing.
It enters the prefrontal cortex.
It enters APUS.
It enters the way we feel whether we can belong or not.

In this study, fNIRS makes visible something urbanists, architects, neuroscientists and public managers need to take seriously: walking is not only displacement. Walking is bodily regulation inside a territory.

Perhaps one of the great tasks of Decolonial Neuroscience is to help build cities where the body does not need to remain constantly in defense.

Cities where the sidewalk is also care.
Where greenery is also health.
Where the façade is also affection.
Where public space is also Jiwasa.

Because a good city does not only allow walking.
It allows breathing, perceiving, enjoying and belonging.

Reference

Brunner, L. M., Aalto, P., Hillnhütter, H., Klöckner, C. A., Steinert, M., & Dybvik, H. (2026). Pleasant walking environments enhance emotional experiences and reduce brain activation — an application of fNIRS in urban studies. Cities, 171, 106768. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2025.106768