A pragmatic environmental psychology: A metatheoretical inquiry into the work of M. Powell Lawton

Environmental psychology is a field of such great diversity—in topics of interest, research approaches, in disciplinarity—that it often appears to lack coherence, exemplified by its poor fit within paradigmatic frameworks found in academic psychology, resulting in its “outlier” status. This paper explores the work of the environmental gerontologist M. Powell Lawton, as an exemplar of environmental psychology research, suggesting that such a review renders greater insight into the current state of the field than any top-down applied conceptual framework. Themes discussed include Lawton's theoretical perspective on the person, the environment, and the relationship between them, his inquiry at various units of analysis; the type of knowledge valued as evidenced in his work; and his fundamental applied orientation, all of which are reflective of contemporary directions within environmental psychology as a whole. Reviewed is Lawton's final proposal that takes an “epistemologically inclusive” approach, embodying all of the themes above and reflective of inquiry sought within pragmatic psychology. As such, it is argued that environmental psychology may find great affinity with the pragmatic psychology approach currently gaining impetus within applied and clinical psychology.     

Oekopsychologie: Some general implications from a particular literature

One goal of this paper is to present a perspective on psychological research in which the relationship between person and environment is the central point of interest. The german term Oekopsychologie is introduced as a higher level framework that subsumes both, the theory-oriented ecological perspective (the Oekologische Psychologie in German), and problem-oriented and environmental psychology (the Umweltpsychologie in German) with its more applied character. It is argued that the ecological perspective should be based on 10 tenets which stem from an emphasis on the fundamental importance of the man-environment relationship. The paper is also an attempt to stimulate bridge-building activities between German-speaking and English-speaking environmental psychologists.     

Phenomenology and the clark experience

The author argues that his research and teaching interests are very much a legacy from Clark University, especially because of events there during the years 1970–72. The essay first identifies four factors—place, time, people, and atmosphere—which seem to have shaped developments in environment-behavior research during that time at Clark and considers how those developments touched the author personally. Second, the author reviews his present research interests in terms of three themes: fostering careful looking and seeing; examining environmental experience; and establishing a phenomenology of place and place-making. He argues that each of these themes is in part a product of his Clark experience during the early 1970s.     

Environmental psychology: Manifold visions, unity of purpose

An attempt is made to understand and integrate the different perspectives on and approaches to environmental psychology. As a whole, the field is oriented to fundamental science, to practice, and to informing policy. Some approaches focus more on the person, some more on the environment, but all acknowledge its unity of purpose to understand the complex relations between people and the built, natural, and living environments around them. Environmental psychology is developing around the world from its North American and European roots, and this growth is enriching its collective vision. Interest in human transactions with the built environment remains, and concern for the natural world, including the optimizing of human relations with other species and the planet is very strong; these manifold visions are the very definition of environmental psychology.     

Swedish environmental psychology

Environmental psychology research in Sweden is reviewed beginning with studies in the 1960s. The traditional main foci of the Swedish research are the visual perception of form, space, colour, and texture, the meaning of social and physical environments; and the effects of the indoor and outdoor ambient environment (noise, air quality and temperature). More recent research foci include environmental cognition (perceptual categorization, cognitive mapping, orientation, planning), affective reactions to the environment, and systems applications. It is concluded that the Swedish research is integrated with environmental psychology research in other countries in terms of a common data base and methodology, despite the fact that the problems investigated are to some extent national in tone. It is also pointed out that the Swedish research appears to have the potential of theoretical contributions to environmental psychology, which is badly needed within the field as a whole.     

Quality of life and sustainability: Toward person–environment congruity

In the light of sustainable development requirements, environmental psychology has an increasing role to play in addressing people–environment congruity. People–environment congruity refers to the interrelation between the individual and his or her (especially: residential) environment, considering the match between individual life satisfaction and objective standards of living. Promoting human well-being requires looking beyond singular effects of environmental features and considering people's overall relationship to their environment. This leads us to look at the residential environment as the place where people–environment congruity is crucial, and to propose a framework of analyses of the conditions of congruity between objective and subjective assessment of environmental stressors in relation to the individual and social expression of well-being. The paper concludes with the implications of people–environment congruity for research and policy-making about sustainable development.     

Towards a Community Based Ethic: A Phenomenological Account of Environmental Change From the Sundarbans’s Islanders

Rapid changes in the environment are far from being a new phenomenon, especially for vulnerable zones like the Sundarbans, India. In the era of climate change, when these islands are witnessing a lot of initiatives to combat the increasing negative impacts of various environmental changes, this article showcases why it is imperative to study the everyday phenomenological experiences of the islanders to be able to go beyond the climate-affected narratives and generate a deeper understanding of the phenomenon itself—‘environmental change’. This article provides the islanders’ phenomenological accounts of environmental change and borrowing from Heidegger’s concept of ‘Being-in-the-world’ explicates the reason behind the disparity in acknowledging environmental change across individuals. Making this interpretive phenomenological account of environmental change as the ground, this article offers a rubric of community-based ethic which perhaps can prove to be effective in addressing any place-specific environmental change, over and above the prevalent approach of place-based ethic.     

Empirical research in environmental psychology: Past, present, and future

Have research interests in environmental psychology changed over the years? If so, in which direction? What can we learn from the past to direct future research? To answer these questions, empirical studies published in Environment & Behavior (E&B) and in Journal of Environmental Psychology (JEP), from their foundation to 2005, were reviewed. The articles were classified in relation to the following criteria: mode of human–environment transaction, research topic, type of setting and function of places, socio-demographic characteristics and environmental role of people, mode of presentation of the setting, sampling procedure, and source of data. Results showed both variations through the years and differences between the journals. The main research topics can be identified as the study of the residential environment, environmental cognition, observation of actual behaviour in the environment, and concern for the ecological value of the global environment. Trends in research interests showed a stable interest in the analysis of the built environment, a more place-specific approach in the beginning, strongly anchored in observational studies, and a central concern for sustainability and conservation of the environment in recent years. With respect to journals, the central role attributed to psychology by JEP, and the stronger participation by designers and planners in E&B, are reflected in the emphases given to the different modes of human–environment transaction. Trends in research interests help address the strengths and weaknesses of the discipline, thus suggesting future directions of inquiry.     

Creating a larger role for environmental psychology: The Reasonable Person Model as an integrative framework

We argue that the environment, broadly construed, has a profound effect on human cognition, action, and well-being. If this is true, then the field of environmental psychology has a far larger potential to aid humanity than is generally realized. We suggest that the field would be more likely to achieve this potential if it viewed environments from the perspective of human informational needs, and focused on environmental/informational patterns that have the potential to make it easier for people to help themselves. Further, achieving such benefits could be greatly enhanced by taking advantage of the many opportunities available for collaborating with researchers in other areas of psychology. The reasonable person model is offered as a perspective that could facilitate moving in these various new directions while taking advantage of the considerable existent knowledge about human–environment interactions that is currently underappreciated.     

The role of media exposure, social exposure and biospheric value orientation in the environmental attitude-intention-behavior model in adolescents

This paper explores the hypothesis that contextual environments (media exposure and social exposure) and biospheric value orientation are important antecedents to the attitude-intention-behavior model ( [Ajzen, 2001] and [Ajzen, 2002] ) in the context of environmental psychology. Data for this investigation were obtained from a random sample of 2106 (1073 males and 1025 females) high school students in Hong Kong. A path analysis demonstrates that adolescents’ social exposure and media exposure are associated with biospheric value orientation. The biosperhic value orientation is found to mediate between the contextual variables (media exposure and social exposure) and environmental attitude. This environmental attitude, in turn, mediates the relationship between this value orientation and behavioral intention to act environmentally. Results show that both adolescents’ behavioral intention and degree of social exposure are associated with their environmental behavior. Overall, this article provides empirical support for the proposed path model. The article concludes by presenting theoretical and practical implications for future research in environmental psychology.     

Place experience, gestalt, and the human–nature relationship

This paper explores some ways in which differing views about the human–nature relationship reflect and are reflected in people's experiences of the places and environments they encounter in their lives. I first describe how ideas of humans being “part of” versus “apart from” nature have appeared in discussions of environmental ethics and management, and suggest how these contrasting views might relate to people's actual experiences of the natural and human aspects of places. Using qualitative survey responses about outdoor places in the midwestern USA to illustrate ideas from phenomenological and gestalt psychology, I show how a sense of the human–nature relationship is conveyed in the gestalt qualities of places and how this may give rise to a feeling of moral responsibility toward nature. I conclude that the experience of human and natural aspects of real places points toward a dialectical view of the human–nature relationship, in which humans can be seen as simultaneously “part of” and “apart from” nature.     

Does adding more lettuce make a hamburger truly green? A metaphor behind the green movement paradigm in designing cities

In designing cities, the label of the green movement these days is being applied to almost everything—starting from works of environmental non-governmental organizations and international as well as local conservation organizations to grass-roots resistance activism including radical environmentalism. This paper seeks to understand the motivation—the paradigm—behind the green movement initiatives and how the paradigm appears to shift from the ground reality. Conclusions suggest that, on one hand, environmental problems are far from being a matter of common sense and, on the other, the matter of intellectual and technological developments—the outcomes of rigorous academic research reflected in endless literature predominantly comprising the fields of environmental sociology, environmental anthropology, and conservation psychology—are in reality often found to be dealt with by shallow planning and policy practices without even realizing the big-picture that the paradigm is merely being used as an advertizing tool for making business profit. It is expected that, unless a shift from such negative practices towards a conscious and genuine commitment to proactive environmental stewardship is made, the situation will continue to be exacerbated.     

Exploring insideness in urban children’s sense of place

This study, informed by phenomenology and ethnography, explores urban children’s relationship with their urban environment: In what ways do urban children exhibit “insideness” in their sense of place? This study proposes “insideness” as a conceptual construct to understand urban children’s sense of place in its ecological and dynamic nature. Employing qualitative research methods, the study explores place stories of urban children who live in low-income, immigrant neighborhoods in New York City. The study finds that as children cultivate their sense of place, they construct “insideness” in their sense of place including 1) environmental understanding (i.e., contextualized, comprehensive, and critical understanding of a place), 2) environmental competence (i.e., knowing how to navigate and engage in a place), and 3) diverse, strong affective relationships with a place. Using “insideness” as a conceptual tool, this study discusses children’s emplaced understanding and active and dialogical positionality in the development of their sense of place.     

An ecological perspective on theory, methods, and analysis in environmental psychology: Advances and challenges

Over the course of environmental psychology's brief history, there has been an interest in ecologically oriented approaches to theory and research. Based on this work, this paper identifies a set of six principles of ecological analysis that present theoretical, methodological, and analytic challenges to future research in environmental psychology. These challenges include the theoretical treatment of the multiple contexts within which human experience and behavior occurs, the need for sampling both persons and environments, the modeling of moderating and mediating processes, the issue of self-selection into and out of different settings, the necessity of considering temporal factors in environmental research, reliance on single methods (e.g., verbal report) in data generation, cross-sectional and longitudinal research designs, and the need for greater use of statistical techniques developed for contextual (multi-level) research. These issues are discussed and illustrated using recent developments in environmentally oriented research. The paper concludes with a set of 11 recommendations for the future.     

Toward an applied phenomenology: The case of abandoned pier use in Hoboken,New Jersey,USA

This research demonstrates the contribution of phenomenological inquiry within the realm of geographic and environmental planning. The contention is that a focus on the wide range of individual meanings and values ascribed to landscapes, a marginalized element in many planning assessments, can bring out data to more substantively inform decision making, A case study of user meanings imparted to residual waterfront land in Hoboken, New Jersey, USA, suggests that such property provides an array of amenities to residents. Most importantly, it expands the range of recreational activities, creates visual relief from the monotonous urban milieu, and provides scenic vistas to promote an awareness of the quality of life still possible in cities. The study concludes that planners can use phenomenology to generate data for more judicious decision making.     

Is there a place for social capital in the psychology of health and place?

The field of environmental psychology is primely placed to further understanding of the way in which social capital influences or is influenced by the context and characteristics of neighbourhood environments, but has been one of the quieter voices in the cacophony of social capital discourse over the last decade. While there is increasing research interest in area and neighbourhood variations in social capital, the mechanisms and causal pathways through which physical environments, social capital and health may be related are not yet clear. More refined unpacking of the relationship between social capital and neighbourhood design, features and settings is required to identify practical intervention points for preserving, fostering and harnessing social capital within communities. Through a review of literature, this paper explores whether there is a place for social capital in the psychology of place and considers the contribution that environmental psychology and related disciplines could make to future social capital research and applications.     

Introduction to the special issue: Place,identity and environmental behaviour

Research on identity has proliferated in recent decades, particularly within environmental psychology; the physical environment has been shown to have strong connections to a sense of self, and identity has proved to be an important mediator of behaviour. The concept of identity has been defined and measured, however, in a wide variety of ways. The goal of this special issue is to present some of the recent work tying identity to place and behaviour. In our opening essay we describe some of the distinctions among approaches to identity at different levels of specificity and scale and suggest some criteria to determine meaningful sources of identity, including impacts on cognitive processing, emotional responses, and behaviour. Although a monolithic framework is neither practical nor desirable, we encourage greater conceptual and methodological integration in future research on the interconnections among place, identity, and behaviour.     

Environmental planning,ecosystem science,and ecosystem approaches for integrating environment and development

Currently popular concepts such as sustainable development and sustainability seek the integration of environment and development planning. However, there is little evidence that this integration is occurring in either mainstream development planning or environmental planning. This is a function of the history, philosophies, and evolved roles of both. A brief review of the experience and results of mainstream planning, environmental planning, and ecosystem science suggests there is much in past scientific and professional practice that is relevant to the goal of integrated planning for environment and development, but still such commonly recommended reforms as systems and multidisciplinary approaches, institutional integration, and participatory, goal-oriented processes are rarely achieved. “Ecosystem approaches,” as developed and applied in ecology, human ecology, environmental planning, anthropology, psychology, and other disciplines, may provide a more transdisciplinary route to successful integration of environment and development. Experience with ecosystem approaches is reviewed, their advantages and disadvantages are discussed, and they are compared to traditional urban and regional planning, environmental planning, and ecosystem science approaches. Ultimately a synthesis of desirable characteristics for a framework to integrate environment and development planning is presented as a guide for future work and a criterion for evaluating existing programs.