ABSTRACT
The savannah theory was established in the 1980s and 1990s. Savannah landscape as experienced by early humans was believed to be comprised of grassland and scattered trees, and this particular landscape type was somehow imprinted upon us as the most desirable, influencing our mental preferences for landscape ever since. In this chapter in the light of new knowledge the author reassesses the savannah theory and critiques its assumptions of a universal, global, and dominant view of landscape perception. That landscapes can impact our cognitive experiences is related to new ideas in science concerning the very way in which genetic information is expressed in the body, and what controls that expression. Neurological research over the last twenty years has shown that individual brains have the capacity to relearn wiring after some injuries, a phenomena termed neuroplasticity. Importantly in our story about our relationships to landscape, neurological science has also found that our brains are not the same as they once were.
