Topics for Today

• Processes of People-Environment Transaction

– Interpreting the Environment

• Environmental cognition

• Class participation exercise!

Expanding Planetary Awareness by Viewing the Earth from Outer Space

(Schweickart, 1985)

“When you go around the earth in an hour and a half, you begin to recognize that your identity is with that whole thing. That makes a change. You look down and you can’t imagine how many borders and boundaries you cross - hundreds of people killing each other over some imaginary line that you are not even aware of…you wish you could take each by the hand and say “Look at it from this perspective. Look at what’s important.”

Objects vs. Environments

• Objects require subjects. In contrast, one can not be a subject of an environment, only a participant

• Environments surround the individual

• Environments engage multiple sense modalities

• Environments offer peripheral information

• Environment perception always involves action

• Environments convey symbolic meanings and messages

• Environments have an ambiance or “atmosphere”

Modes of P-E Relationships and Related Areas of Research

Stokols (1978)

“Active – Cognitive” / “Interpretive” Mode of P – E Relationships

Cognitive Schema

• A mental representation of the world around us

• A schema provides symbolic categories with which we can make predictions about the environment and evaluate alternative plans of action

(Kelly, 1955; Neisser, 1976)

Cognitive Map

A mental representation of the spatial environment and its organization

In humans, cognitive maps are measured or “externalized” by asking individuals to provide sketch maps of particular environments.

A sketch map of Paris from Milgram & Jodelet (1976)

Cognitive Mapping

The processes by which people acquire and use information about the spatial environment

(Lynch, 1960; Tolman, 1938)

Elements of Cognitive Maps

• Paths

Channels along which the observer moves. Maybe streets, walkways, transit lines, canals, railroads

• Edges

Linear elements not used or considered paths by observes. Shores, railroad cuts, edges of development, walls

Elements of Cognitive Maps

• Districts Medium to large sections of a city,

having a two-dimensional extent, which the observer mentally enters “inside of”

• Nodes The strategic points in a city which

the observer can enter. Primarily junctions, crossing of paths, a square, a street-corner hangout

• Landmarks Type of point of reference, but the

observer does not enter within them. Maybe a building, sign, store

Imageability

Those qualities of a physical object or environment that give it a high probability of evoking a strong image or memory in any observer

(Lynch, 1960)

Legibility

The ease with which the parts of an environment can be recognized and organized into a coherent pattern

(Lynch, 1960)

Developing Quantitative Measures to Evaluate the Imageability of Environments

Example of Measuring Imageability Features: Number of Buildings With Non-Rectangular Shapes

Social Imageability

The capacity of an environment to evoke vivid and widely shared social meanings among occupants of the setting

“The perception of a city is a social fact and as such needs to be studied in its collective as well as its individual aspect…it is not only what exists but what is highlighted by the community that acquires salience in the mind of the person.”

(Milgram & Jodelet, 1976)

“Last walk” Technique Used to Assess Parisians Psychological Attachment to

Specific Places in Paris

(Milgram & Jodelet, 1976)

Relative Salience of City Elements Included in Parisians’ Sketch Map

(Milgram & Jodelet, 1976)

Socioeconomic Status and Mental Maps

(Orleans, 1973)

Modes of P-E Relationships and Related Areas of Research

Stokols (1978)

Class Participation Exercise

• Take out a piece of paper

• Put your name and student ID number on it

• List five of your all time favorite songs

• Now exchange your paper with your neighbor

• Can you make any assessments about your neighbor’s personality through his / her song selections? – Do his / her song selections reflect attachment to a

particular place?

• Remember to put your name on the paper you analyzed as well!