1. UNIT 5 SPATIAL PSYCHOLOGY

2. Environmental Psychology
Environmental psychology is the study of transaction between individual and their physical settings.
In this transaction
Individual change the environment,
Their behavior and experiences are changed by the environment
Thus, environmental psychology includes research and practiced aimed at making building more humane and improving our relationship with the natural environment.

3. Environment & Space The Environment:
The environment that we live in  influences our lives.
Environment
Built setting
Homes, offices, schools, streets etc.
Natural setting
National park, wilderness areas, etc.

4. Elements in the environment includes:-
Human, animals, plants, building
Stimulus in the environment such as noises, weather, heat etc.
Our environment can bring
Positive impact on us (eg. Soft music)
Negative impact on us (heat)
Human are more sensitive about the environment that they live in.

5. Space is defined in terms of who owned the particular space/area.
The Space:
Space is defined in terms of who owned the particular space/area.
Space:
Long term ownership (house)
Short term ownership (hotel room/ hostels)
Temporary ownership (place in a bus) Individual change the environment,

6. Personal space

7. Personal space
The size of personal space and the type of people that are allowed into our personal space depends on:
Someone we know well
Situation

8. Personal space
An area where invisible boundaries surrounding a person’s body into which intruders may not come.
Personal space are portable in nature  where ever you stand or sit  you are surrounded on all sides by personal space.
Personal space is a ay of sending message that we own the space around us (eg maybe ½ feet around us).

9. Function of Personal space
Baum et.al. (1984)
Protection
Communication

10. Influence of situation on personal space
Interpersonal distance (personal space) inform both participants and outside behavior about the nature of the participants relationship (Edward Hall)
4 gradation of interpersonal distance which indicate a slightly diff relationship between participants:
Intimate distance (0-1 ½ ft) – for comforting, protecting, loving, etc.
Personal distance (1 ½ - 4 ft) – is a zone for those who are familiar with one another and on good terms  for social interaction between friends and acquaintance.
Social distance (4-12 ft) – interaction between unacquainted individual or those transacting business
Public distance (>12 ft) – speaker & audience in a seminar room or lecturer & students in a classroom

11. TERRITORIALITY

12. What is Territoriality?
Psychological definition  involves behavior and cognition related to a place.
According to Julian Edney, territoriality involves:
Physical space
Possession
Defense
Exclusiveness of use
Markers
Personalization
Dominance
Conflict
Security
Claim staking
Arousal
vigilance
Identity
Control

13. Territoriality is a pattern of behavior and attitude held by an individual or group that is based on perceived, attempted or actual control of definable physical space, object or ideas that may involve habitual occupation, defense, personalization and marking of it.
Marking
Placing an object or substance in a space to indicate one’s territorial intention
Personalization
Marking in a manner that indicate one’s identity.
A territorial is a place where an individual/or a group of individual lives exclusively,  and defend it from trespassers.

14. 3 types of territory used by human (Altman system)
Primary territories
Spaces owned by individuals/primary groups, controlled on a relatively permanent basis by them and central to their daily lives. (Bedroom, kitchen, familiar dwellings)
Secondary territories
Less important to us  but do posses moderate significance to their occupants (office desk, favorite restaurant, classroom)
Control of these territories is less essential to the current occupant  more likely to change, rotate or be shared with strangers.
Public territories
Open to anyone in the community  open to outsiders (Beach, hotel lobby, shops etc)

15. Crowding

16. Crowding The world is increasingly crowded.
Examples of crowded situation:
Crowding at the personal level  has an immediate impact on us. For example, give rise to frustration/aggression

17. Crowding
Crowding refers to a person’s experience of the number of other people around.
Rather than physical ratio, crowding is a personally defined, subjective feelings that too many others are around.
Crowding may correspond to high density

18. 3 components of crowding
Crowding is based on situational antecedent
Eg. Too many people approach too close in one area/ situation
Space is reduce by the arrival of a visitor or a new room mate
Crowding implies emotion of affect, usually negative
Crowding will produce some kind of behavioral response
Ranging from overt aggressive – withdrawing from social interaction.

19. The experience of crowding is accentuated by:
Personal factors
Personality, expectation, attitude, sex etc.
Social factors
The number, type and action of others, and the degree of attitude similarity.
Physical factors
Architectural features & spatial arrangement

20. DENSITY

21. Density
Density is an objective measure of individuals per unit of area.
Density is measured by the number of individual per unit area
Measured in terms of people per sq feet/meter
The room, building neighborhood, cities, nation  in which an individual is located  all have different densities
Researchers in environmental psychology always interested to observe the impact of density on human.

22. Type of density Indoor density
Ratio of individuals to space inside building
Prolong high indoor density  often impairs mental & physical health, task performance, child development & social interaction
Sensory overloads and lack of personal control lead to many negative outcomes
Outdoor density
Ratio of individuals to space outside building
High outdoor density (such as in big cities)  can provide an enjoyable variety of social & cultural experience.
Higher outdoor density is much better than higher indoor density

23. Ways to reduce the negative effect of high density:
Through careful environmental design
Partitions
Behavioral zoning
Provide more space

24. Privacy

25. Privacy What is privacy? According to Altman
“Privacy is a selective control of access to the self or to one’s group”
Thus, privacy is a process in which we attempt to regulate interaction with others including social interaction and information about the self that may be kept on a file

26. For many people, privacy means:-
Being apart from other people
Being sure that other people or organization do not have access to one’s personal information.
Privacy is manifested in our behavior, preference, values, needs and expectations.
Invasion of privacy occur when
Someone physically intrudes on us
Someone collect information about us that we don’t want them to have.

27. Privacy is closely related to territoriality, crowding and personal space.
It is part of the way we speak, our non-verbal behavior and our psychological development (emotion, identity & sense of control)