Ecology of the Indoors: Interior spaces deserve as much scientific inquiry as the wilderness.

• Author: Larson, Christina
• Position: On political books

The Great Indoors: The Surprising Science of How Buildings Shape Our Behavior, Health, and Happiness

by Emily Anthes

Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 306 pp.

I am unapologetically indoorsy," writes the science journalist Emily Anthes in her new book, The Great Indoors. "Lots of journalists file dispatches from far-flung places--reporting on wildlife in the Serengeti, floods in the Mekong Delta, and ice cores in Antarctica--but I've always felt most comfortable plying my craft from deep inside my living room."

As the era of COVID-ig self-isolation wears on, those of us lucky enough to be employed and able to work remotely have spent months plying our craft from the sofa or the basement. But being stuck inside doesn't mean being nowhere. Indoor spaces can be just as consequential as outdoor ones, whether a cozy bedroom nook or a swirling marble staircase. The Great Indoors is a rollicking exploration of how everything from lighting to ventilation, noise levels to stairwells, shapes our physical health and mental well-being.

The book's central premise is that the great indoors deserves as much scientific and sociological investigation as the wilderness. "The indoor environment shapes our lives in far-reaching and sometimes surprising ways," Anthes writes. We may daydream about mountains and oceans, but most of us, at least in the developed world, spend the bulk of our time under a low ceiling. "Modern humans are essentially an indoor species," she says, pointing to research that North Americans and Europeans spent nine-tenths of their lives indoors even before the current pandemic. The global tide of urbanization will only accelerate this indoors-ification. The United Nations estimates that over the next 40 years, indoor square footage--enclosed spaces of homes, offices, airports, stores, and more--will nearly double.

The science of buildings, especially life inside them, is not a discrete specialty, so Anthes takes a broad approach to her inquiry. She interviews microbiologists studying bacteria in bathrooms, neuroscientists looking at how our brains respond to lighting changes, and anthropologists investigating how architecture shapes personal interactions. The book is not marshaling evidence to make a narrow argument but, rather, inviting readers to find unexpected significance in the familiar spaces of our homes, hospitals, and workplaces.

One point of consensus: Open offices were a terrible idea, even before COVID-19 arrived. They don't...