Question

What is the relationship between the physical environment and human behavior? What are some implications of the research on the relationship between the physical environment and human behavior for social work practice?

Answer 1

What is the relationship between the physical environment and human behavior? What are some implication of the research on the relationship between physical environment and human behavior for social work practice?

Answer: The relationship between physical environment and human behavior is a complex relationship and it includes contribution from social, behavioral and health science psychology, sociology, geography and public health as well as from design disciplines of architecture, landscape, interior design and urban and regional planning. There are four broad categories about interaction of theory of human behavior and physcial environment: simulation theories, control theoris, behavior theories and ecocritical theories.

Simulation theories: These theories focus on the physical environment. The simulation theorists propose the patterns of simulation like light, color, heat, texture ects influence thinking, feelings, social interaction and health. Simulation theories based on theories of psycho-physical arousal assume that moderate level of simulation are optimal for human behavior. Both, stimulus overload and stimulus deprivation have negative effect on human behavior. According to social behavioral persepective, people have concrete effect of stimulation on behavior and also meanings that people persue in regards to a particular stimuli. According to the stimulation theories, the physical environment is a source of sensory information for human well-being. Implications of Simulation theories: There are studies which shows that how people's brain respond to different type of environment and their goal is to use the knowledge to design environments that support brain development and funcationing for the general population as well as for groups special needs. Neuroscientists are also working with architects and environmenta psychologists to learn how the physical environment stimulate emotional and physical healling.

Control Theories: Control theories deals with the ability to gain control over one's physical environment. Four concepts that are central to the work of control theorists are: privacy, personal space, territoriality and crowing.

Privacy is define as selective control access to self or to one's group. Privacy involves control over information about conself as well as control out interactions with others. Some people requires more privacy than others and some situations stimulate privacy needs more than other situation. Implication of research works on privacy: Poeple in different cultures use space differently to create privacy. Researchers have examined the physical attributes of workplace offices that satisfy the privacy needs of US work force. In recent decades, employers have limited personal space of employees, using open plan cubicles based on the belief that such open plan arrangements will facilitate communication among employees.

Personal Space is the physical distance we choose to maintain interpersonal relationship. Personal space is not stable and it contracts or expands with changing interpersonal circumstances and variations in physical settings. For example, the distance while talking to your best friend is different from the distance you prefer while talking to your boss. Variations in personal space are also thought to be related to age, gender, culture et al. Implication of recent research on personal space: Recent studies questions the implication of digital technology on personal space. For example, a person may be reluctant to talk about what he thinks on a telephone call or in a personal conversation. However, the same person may talk the same thing through an email or any other eletronic conversation. Also, researchers are also investigating how the personal space applies to virtual worlds such as Computer games and find that people tend to keep and protect a space around their avatars in much the same way they do in real world.

Territoriality refers primariliy to the behavior of individuals and small groups as they seek control over physical space. This concept has also been used to refer to attempts to control objects, roles and relationships. Territoriality is defined as a pattern of behavior and attitudes held by an individual or group based on perceived, attempted or actual ownership or control of a definable physical space. A primary territory is one that evokes feelings of ownership that we control and this includes our home, place of work etc. Secondary territorial are less important to us than primary territories and control of them does not seem as essential to us for example McDonald's Cafe. Public territorial are those which are open to anyone in the community and we generally make no attempt to access control, for example public park Implication of research work on territoriality: For humans, there are evidences that males are more territorial than females, but there is also a contradictory evidence. In crowded living conditions in Nigerian university residence halls, female students appeared to use more territorial strategies to cope while male students used more withdrawal strategy.

Crowding means the feeling of being influenced or crowded by an interaction of personal, social and cultural as well as physical factors. Crowding is subjected to the feeling of having too many people around. Implication of research work on crowding: It has been found that feeling of crowding is different in different ethnic groups as well as different in different genders. For example, women living in crowded homes are more like to be depressed while men living in crowded homes demonstrate higher levels of withdrawal and violence.

Behavior Settings Theories: According to Behavior setting theories, consistent, uniform patterns of behavior occur in particular places or behavior settings. Behavior is always tied to specific space. It is found that behavior of different person in same settting were more similar than observations of the same person in different settings. For example, our behavior in musical festival is more similar to behavior of ther in musical festival than it is to our own behavior in classroom. Implications of research work: Behavior settings theory has been extended to explain behavior in settings other than physical behavior settings, more specifically to explain behavior in virtual behavior settings such as chat rooms and blogs.

Ecocritical Theories: This theory deals with relationships and interactions between living organisms and their environment. This theor emphasizes the interdependence and mutual influence of organism and their environment. There are two such theories developed recently: 1. Deep ecology: It suggests that social work should focus on "person with environment" rather than "person and environment". It emphasizes the total interconnectedness of all elements of natural and physical world. It also calls for a an attention to the way human are interacting with natural environment, leading to global warming, pollution etc. 2. Ecofeminism: Ecofeminism is described as feminist approach to environmental ethics. Ecofeminists see oppression of women and domination of nature as interconnnected. They suggest that nature and women have been conceptualized as a separate and inferior in order to legitmate dominance over them by an elite.