FRIENDLY HOME – MORAL INHABITANTS? 2 nd World Conference on Personality 31 st March – 4 th April, 2016, Busios, Brasil Sofya Nartova-Bochaver National Research University ”Higher School of Economics”, Moscow, Russia Supported by Russian Science Foundation, project №

Co-authors

Why do we need studying the home environment? Home is a very basic “οἶκος” in people’s lives Seeking ecological ways to study personality Jungian psychoanalysis: the home is a symbol of personality Everyday life practices and techniques are the most reliable source of unguided self-therapy A.Lang (1991): psychology shouldn’t investigate artificial labor variables but rather people with their things in their rooms. Home is a source of inhabitants’ stability, basic confidence, and psychological well-being.

The basic concepts House, home, dwelling, household, housing environment, and personal living space. Home (environment) is as integrity of physical, social, and existential properties of concrete place satisfying inhabitants’ needs (for security, comfort, identity, etc.). Friendliness of the home shows how many affordances home environment concludes and how many of them are available to inhabitants’ usage (Brunswik, 1956; Greeno, 1984; Harter, 1988; Kytta, 2004; Coolen, 2011).

Theoretical framework Anthropology and geography: the home is a sort of “significant place”; people perceive influences and change their environments at the same time (Ingold, 2002; Moser, 2009; Chow, Healey, 2008, Wright, Bret, 2007; Xu et al., 2015). Psychoanalysis and sociology: the main cultural functions of the home are the following: defense, place for communication and family, a source of inhabitants’ stability, basic confidence, and psychological well-being. Home is an antipole of chaos and cosmos (Bochaver, 2015). Environmental psychology: every person selects affordances from “objective” environment helping this person in satisfying his/her needs (Gibson, 1986). Two approaches: to identify the single units of environment (a physical structure, territory, locus of space, etc.), or to consider home a holistic structure matching the dwellers (phenomenologists’ position regarding the home as a part of “Dasein”).

A new turning-point – does friendly home make inhabitants more moral? Why do we expect receiving any interesting connections? A.Maslow: “higher” needs appeared after the basic needs for safety, stability, etc., had been satisfied (people who are living in the convenient comfortable circumstances could more likely behave in a moral way). Researches on the moral development: moral representations, attitudes, and behavior depend not only on personality but also on the situation or environment (Nartova-Bochaver, 1993; Schmitt et al., 2008). In the friendly homes, people feel safer; they practice trusting world view; as a result, they could become more kind and moral personalities.

Our aim: to investigate the connection between friendliness of the home environment and moral motives level. Hypotheses: 1) friendliness of the home environment is positively connected with inhabitants’ moral motives; 2) this connection is moderated by gender. Sample was consisted of 550 respondents (24% male, 35 respondents did not indicate their gender) aged from 17 to 30 (M=20.6, SD=2.3).

Methods 1. The ‘Functionality of the Home Environment’ questionnaire (scales: Pragmatism; Development; Stability; Protection). Examples of FHE items: My home can… Demonstrate the level of wealth; Be accessible (geographically and financially); Be spacious; Give the opportunity to care for themselves; etc. 2. The ‘Relevance of the Home Environment’ questionnaire (scales: Management of the home environment; Potential; Self- presentation; Ergonomics; Home detachment; Plasticity; Historicity). Examples of RHE items: At home, I feel myself; People in our houses have a good job and prosperity; I have no need to buy my own house; My house can "talk" to the guest about my victories and hobbies; etc. 3. The Moral Motivation Model (scales: Self-Restraint, Not Harming, Social Order, Self-Reliance (Industriousness), Helping/Fairness, Social Justice (Janoff-Bulman & Carnes, 2013).

Results

Connections between Home environment and moral motives in males Measure Helping Fairness Not Harming Social Justice Social Order Self- Reliance Self- Restraint HE Functionality0,30**0,19*0,25**0,33***0,150,26** Pragmatism0,36***0,25**0,31***0,28**0,160,19* Development0,28**0,110,150,29**0,150,19* Stability0,26**0,170,19*0,29**0,090,21 Protection0,25**0,21*0,27**0,29**0,140,25** HE Relevance0,33***0,28**0,35***0,39***0,32***0,18 Managment0,35***0,33*** 0,30**0,33***0,20* Potential0,34***0,26**0,31***0,37***0,36***0,15 Self- representation 0,25** 0,34***0,31***0,170,12 Ergonomics0,26**0,24**0,33***0,29**0,22*0,13 Detachment-0,22**-0,23*-0,15-0,05-0,29**-0,09 Plasticity0,070,090,24*0,24**0,130,04 Hystoricity0,180,120,21*0,27**0,10

Connections between Home environment and moral motives in females Measure Helping Fairness Not Harming Social Justice Social Order Self- Reliance Self- Restraint HE Functionality 0,080,070,000,060,18***0,02 Pragmatism 0,070,05-0,010,080,21***0,02 Development 0,10*0,070,050,070,13**0,04 Stability 0,070,100,010,090,16**0,01 Protection 0,070,060,030,070,16**0,02 HE Relevance 0,11*0,12*0,050,060,23***0,02 Managment 0,05 -0,020,010,23***-0,01 Potential 0,17**0,15**0,090,14**0,27***0,08 Self- representation 0,12*0,080,060,070,21***0,02 Ergonomics 0,16**0,21***0,15**0,13*0,24***0,09 Detachment -0,020,000,040,02-0,20***0,05 Plasticity 0,040,10*0,09 0,15**0,06 Hystoricity 0,14**0,11*0,090,03-0,01

Home Environment -> Moral motives in males

Home Environment -> Moral motives in females

Moral motives -> Home Environment in males

Moral motives -> Home Environment in females

Discussion: Why is it so? Different functions of home, connected with gender roles: stability and domestic routine for women, stimulation and poetry for men. Proximal support for women, moved off (“telescopic”) – for men.

Conclusions Hypotheses have been confirmed. The friendlier and more welcoming home is the more positive and altruistic inhabitants are. These links are stronger and better nuanced in males. In males, friendliness of the home environment predicts moral motives level. In females, we received “inverted” data: moral motives predict home representations.

Limitations 1. The sample consisted of the students mainly, and wasn’t randomized by gender. 2. Secondly, our work deals not with real home but with home representation; it damages ecological validity of the study. 3. Results stay in accordance to the traditional gender roles but most of participants haven’t got any personal experiences both in family and work yet.

Acknowledgements I am grateful very much to Prof. Ronnie Janoff-Bulman for your kind permission to use MMM scale and to my student Elisaveta Moskovchenko for the pictures from her course work. We thank all the participants who took part in our study.

Thank you for your attention! Obrigado!