E-Book
82,99 €

Place Advantage E-Book

Sally Augustin

0,0

82,99 €

Sammeln Sie Punkte in unserem Gutscheinprogramm und kaufen Sie E-Books und Hörbücher mit bis zu 100% Rabatt.

Mehr erfahren.

Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
Sprache: Englisch

Beschreibung

Using psychology to develop spaces that enrich human experience Place design matters. Everyone perceives the world around them in a slightly different way, but there are fundamental laws that describe how people experience their physical environments. Place science principles can be applied in homes, schools, stores, restaurants, workplaces, healthcare facilities, and the other spaces people inhabit. This guide to person-centered place design shows architects, landscape architects, interior designers, and other interested individuals how to develop spaces that enrich human experience using concepts derived from rigorous qualitative and quantitative research. In Place Advantage: Applied Psychology for Interior Architecture, applied environmental psychologist Sally Augustin offers design practitioners accessible environmental psychological insights into how elements of the physical environment influence human attitudes and behaviors. She introduces the general principles of place science and shows how factors such as colors, scents, textures, and the spatial composition of a room, as well as personality and cultural identity, impact the experience of a place. These principles are applied to multiple building types, including residences, workplaces, healthcare facilities, schools, and retail spaces. Building a bridge between research and design practice, Place Advantage gives people designing and using spaces the evidence-based information and psychological insight to create environments that encourage people to work effectively, learn better, get healthy, and enjoy life.

Details

Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:

Android

iOS

von Legimi
zertifizierten E-Readern

Seitenzahl: 594

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Bewertungen

0,0

Rezensionen(0 Rezensionen)

Leseprobe

Cover

Title

Dedication

FOREWORD

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

1: OVERVIEW OF THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPERIENCE OF SPACE

PLAN OF THE BOOK

APPLYING PLACE SCIENCE

2: FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN INTERACTIONS WITH THEIR PHYSICAL WORLD

PLACE SCIENCE IN ACTION

SOUVENIRS FROM OUR LIVES ON THE SAVANNA

DESIGN EXPERIENCE AND RESPONSES TO PLACES

3: BASIC HUMAN NEEDS SATISFIED THROUGH PLACE DESIGN

4: UNIVERSAL FEATURES OF WELL-DESIGNED SPACES

COMPLYING

COMMUNICATING

COMFORTING

CHALLENGING

CONTINUING

5: EMOTIONAL AND COGNITIVE RESPONSES TO SENSORY INFORMATION

INTRODUCTION

SMELLING: MAGICAL, MYSTERIOUS, AND POWERFUL

HEARING: PRIMAL, DEPENDABLE, AND ENDURING

SEEING: VITAL, FOCAL, AND INFLUENTIAL

TOUCHING: SUBTLE, SENSUAL, AND UNDENIABLE

TASTING

FUTURE SENSATIONS

CONCLUSION

6: HUMANRE ACTIONS TO STATIC ELEMENTS

ENTRYWAYS

CEILINGS

SEAT PLACEMENT

PERSONAL SPACE

SEENOR NOT SEEN

CROWDING

TERRITORIES

DESIGNING WITH NATURE

7: PLACE DESIGN THAT REFLECTS INDIVIDUAL PERSONALITY AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE

PERSONALITY AND PLACE

ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE AND PLACE

8: NATIONAL CULTURE AND PLACE EXPERIENCE

DIFFERENT WAYS TO PERCEIVE THE WORLD

DIFFERENT WAYS TO USE SPACE

CONCLUSION

9: PREDOMINANT ACTIVITY AND THE DESIGN OF PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENTS

10: INTEGRATED APPLICATIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY-BASED PLACE DESIGN PRINCIPLES

INTELLECTUAL LIVING

ARTISAN LIVING

TEAMMATE LIFE

SOPHISTICATE LIVING

RECOGNIZING INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES

11: RESEARCH METHODS FOR PLACE DESIGNERS

RESEARCH OVERVIEW

WRITTEN SURVEYS

INDIVIDUAL INTERVIEWS

GROUP DISCUSSIONS

OBSERVATION

12: SPECIAL FOCUS: HOMES

COMFORTING

COMMUNICATING

COMPLYING

CHALLENGING

CONTINUING

13: SPECIAL FOCUS: WORK PLACES

COMMUNICATING

COMFORTING

COMPLYING

CHALLENGING

CONTINUING

14: SPECIAL FOCUS: RETAILS PACES

COMPLYING

COMMUNICATING

COMFORTING

15: SPECIAL FOCUS: LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

COMMUNICATING

COMPLYING

COMFORTING

CREATING GREAT PLACES FOR TEACHERS TO WORK

16: SPECIAL FOCUS: HEALTHCARE FACILITIES

COMMUNICATING

COMFORTING

COMPLYING

17: PLACE DESIGNERS’ VITAL INFLUENCE ON HUMAN WELL-BEING

IMPORTANT SOURCES/RELATEDRE ADINGS

INDEX

End User License Agreement

Guide

Cover

Table of Contents

Begin Reading

Pages

cover

content

iii

xiii

100

101

102

103

104

105

106

107

108

109

110

111

112

113

114

115

116

117

118

119

120

121

122

123

124

125

126

127

128

129

130

131

132

133

134

135

136

137

139

140

141

142

143

144

145

146

147

149

150

151

152

153

154

155

156

157

158

159

160

161

162

163

164

165

166

167

168

169

170

171

172

173

174

175

176

177

178

179

180

181

182

183

184

185

186

187

188

189

190

191

192

193

194

195

196

197

198

199

200

201

202

203

204

205

206

207

209

210

211

212

213

214

215

216

217

218

219

221

222

223

224

225

226

227

228

229

230

231

232

233

234

235

236

237

238

239

240

241

242

243

244

245

247

248

249

250

251

252

253

254

255

256

257

258

259

260

261

262

263

264

265

266

267

268

269

270

271

272

273

274

275

276

277

278

279

280

281

282

283

284

285

287

288

289

290

291

292

293

294

295

296

297

List of Illustrations

2: FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN INTERACTIONS WITH THEIR PHYSICAL WORLD

FIGURE 2-1 The Parthenon, an early achievement of “place scientists.” The symmetrical arrangement of the columns and the scale of the elements, for example, create a serene and awe-inspiring space for religious and civic events. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Keith Binns.

FIGURE 2-2 Many of our current environmental responses are related to our ancestors’ experiences while they scrambled to survive without the tools and technologies that we currently find so useful. Being near a tree was very desirable in the old, old days—it regulated air temperature and provided protection from at least some of the animals that preyed upon them. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Eliza Snow.

FIGURE 2-3 Humans enjoy dappled light inside and outside. The sun passing through a leafy canopy on a sunny day distributes dollops of sunlight on the ground, and our ancestors would have associated this splotchy light with good things (pleasant weather and nearby escape into the tree). Copyright © iStockPhoto/John Goldie.

4: UNIVERSAL FEATURES OF WELL-DESIGNED SPACES

FIGURE 4-2 This hospital room is zoned to promote healing. Patients can rest in one part of the space, bathe in a second area, and socialize with others, work, or relax on the balcony or in the nook with the couch and desk. Caregivers have workstations within the space, and patients’ visitors can also use these spaces in various ways. Image courtesy of Anshen+Allen, © 2008.

FIGURE 4-3 Even though we are social animals, sometimes humans need to be alone. When we are alone, we can mull over recent events or concentrate to solve difficult problems. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Nikada.

FIGURE 4-4 The blinds on the windows in these offices allow people to regulate their interactions with others. All human beings need to be able to control when and how they socialize with their colleagues, family members, friends, and strangers. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Andrey Popov.

FIGURE 4-5 This view is restorative. The water, open spaces, and bordering trees capture our attention, and we can effortlessly review the information presented to us through these windows—which is mentally refreshing. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Feng Yu.

5: EMOTIONAL AND COGNITIVE RESPONSES TO SENSORY INFORMATION

FIGURE 5-9 People walk near lights and lighted surfaces. Placing lights along walls in a hallway organizes travel in that space and ensures that people can efficiently move through it. Copyright © iStockPhoto/xyno.

6: HUMANRE ACTIONS TO STATIC ELEMENTS

FIGURE 6-1 Diners will feel comfortable in these booths because nothing can sneak up behind them and turn

them

FIGURE 6-2 Few people will be comfortable sitting in this bank lobby. The backs of people in these chairs are against a wall, but it is made of visually permeable glass. Courtesy of Sally Augustin.

FIGURE 6-3 Seats can be arranged to encourage people not to talk by keeping them all facing the same direction. In certain situations, conversation among people in a space is counterproductive. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Andrew Horwitz.

FIGURE 6-4 The members of the Dutch parliament, who use this space, can easily engage each other in conversation. This sort of interaction between legislators is desirable. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Jan Kranendonk.

FIGURE 6-5 Cross-corner seating can be useful in many situations, particularly during conversations that may cover difficult topics—participants can gracefully break eye contact. Copyright © iStockPhoto/bubbalove.

FIGURE 6-6 This bench provides passersby with many seating and orientation options. They can sit so that it is easy for them to make eye contact with other people or on parts of the bench where comfortable seating postures preclude direct visual contact—all of which leads to different levels of intimacy, cooperation, etc. Courtesy of Sally Augustin.

FIGURE 6-7 The executive assigned to this desk can choose to sit across the desk from guests or beside them at the conference table, as appropriate. Each of these seating configurations is useful in particular social situations. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Don Bayley.

FIGURE 6-8 Calm water has a soothing psychological influence on people, which may be useful where this pool is located, directly outside a hospital. Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, Monterey, CA. Photo by Lawrence Anderson/Courtesy of HOK.

FIGURE 6-9 This hospital lobby incorporates many natural materials, which is a biophilic design strategy. Biophilic design recognizes the important relationship between human beings and their natural environment. Curt Knoke Photography, Shawano Medical Center, Copyright 2007, courtesy of Kahler Slater.

FIGURE 6-10 The natural forms in this church form a stark contrast to the lines of the modern office tower behind it. Use of shapes and other design elements that are reminiscent of the natural world is a principle of biophilic design. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Daniel Stein.

FIGURE 6-12 These windows have the sort of detailing suggested by Bloomer (2008). That detailing links people inside the spaces with the world they are surveying. Courtesy of Sally Augustin.

7: PLACE DESIGN THAT REFLECTS INDIVIDUAL PERSONALITY AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE

FIGURE 7-2 This sort of rectilinear environment would appeal to people who feel that they control their own fate. HCA Stone Oak Hospital, San Antonio, TX. Courtesy of HOK.

8: NATIONAL CULTURE AND PLACE EXPERIENCE

FIGURES 8-1 A TO D People from very different national cultures will be comfortable in each of these rooms. Each space uses structural elements and sensory stimuli (such as colors) in ways that are consistent with the national cultures of their primary users. Without that consistency, people are tense and distracted; they cannot thrive. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Alain Couillaud, Andrey Rodionov, atbaei, and Imre Cikajlo, respectively.

9: PREDOMINANT ACTIVITY AND THE DESIGN OF PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENTS

FIGURE 9-1 This person is regulating her stimulation level by isolating herself in a meeting room. She has turned her back to passersby to avoid interactions with others and partially closed the blinds so that people can see the room is occupied, but the person in it prefers to be alone. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Nilgun Bostanci.

12: SPECIAL FOCUS: HOMES

FIGURE 12-1 Territories are not necessarily private. This balcony is clearly visible to passersby, but only the residents of the space through which it is entered can use it. More public territories give people who control them the opportunity to express who they are to a wider range of other people. Copyright © iStockPhoto/red_moon_rise.

13: SPECIAL FOCUS: WORK PLACES

FIGURE 13-5 Task lighting provides some environmental control to workers. Environmental control has important implications for worker satisfaction and performance. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Alenjandro Raymond.

FIGURE 13-6 The doors on these workstations provide visual privacy to workers and also eliminate visual distractions. Jim Brozek Photography, Miller Brewing—Chicago Workstations, Copyright 2006, courtesy of Kahler Slater.

FIGURE 13-7 Workers traveling between floors on open, central staircases can see into the workspaces of other teams, which can spur communication and knowledge sharing (Allen and Henn 2007). Copyright © 2008 Farshid Assassi, courtesy of BNIM.

14: SPECIAL FOCUS: RETAILS PACES

FIGURE 14-1 The movement and sound of the water in this fountain will calm shoppers. That calming helps them to concentrate, which is desirable when certain goods (generally more expensive ones) are being purchased, but is not desirable at other times (when impulse purchases are important). Courtesy of Sally Augustin.

FIGURE 14-3 The lamps on these restaurant tables create tiny territories for each pair of diners. Those territories can inspire people to linger, which is desirable in restaurants that serve after-dinner drinks and desserts. Copyright © iStockPhoto/Xavi Arnau.

15: SPECIAL FOCUS: LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

FIGURE 15-1 Pupils learn better in classrooms with more sunlight. Photo provided by Fielding Nair International, Architects and Change Agents for Education (www.fieldingnair.com).

FIGURE 15-2 Flexible seating allows meetings of different types to occur in the same space. Using the same space for multiple purposes can better serve user needs while reducing the assortment of spaces that must be constructed. Photo provided by Fielding Nair International, Architects and Change Agents for Education (www.fieldingnair.com).

FIGURE 15-3 Nature views at school help both students and teachers restock their mental energy levels. Photo provided by Fielding Nair International, Architects and Change Agents for Education (www.fieldingnair.com).

16: SPECIAL FOCUS: HEALTHCARE FACILITIES

FIGURE 16-1 This waiting area uses homelike furniture and has a dropped ceiling, which differentiates this space from the rest of the lobby. These effects combine to make this a more desirable space for visitors to linger. BJC Progress West, O’Fallon, MO. Courtesy of HOK.

FIGURE 16-2 This patient room has a restorative nature view and a nature video on the monitor, all drenched in healing sunshine. These interactions with the natural world promote psychological and physical health. Image Courtesy of Anshen+Allen, © 2008.

FIGURE 16-3 This waiting area has a stress-reducing nature view. Jim Brozek Photography, St. Clare Hospital and Health Services—Lake Delton Clinic Waiting Room. Copyright © 2006, courtesy of Kahler Slater.

FIGURES 16-4 AND 16-5 Two easy-to-use signs—one in a hospital and one at the entry to a transit line stop. Both make it clear where travelers should go. The subway signs, which are also color coded, are placed so that it is impossible for people not to see them and read them clearly (except during extremely busy travel periods). Figure 16-4 Copyright © iStock-Photo/Brandon Gunem. Figure 16-5 Courtesy of Sally Augustin.

17: PLACE DESIGNERS’ VITAL INFLUENCE ON HUMAN WELL-BEING

Place Advantage

APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY FOR INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE

Sally Augustin, PhD

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, (978) 750-8400, fax (978) 646-8600, or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748-6011, fax (201) 748-6008, or online at www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and the author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

For general information about our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at (800) 762-2974, outside the United States at (317) 572-3993 or fax (317) 572-4002.

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. For more information about Wiley products, visit our web site at www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Augustin, Sally.

Place advantage : applied psychology for interior architecture / Sally Augustin.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-470-42212-0 (cloth : alk. paper)

1. Interior architecture—Psychological aspects. I. Title.

NA2850.A94 2009

747.01'9—dc22

2008045487

This book is dedicated to Stu Oskamp, PhD, and Harv Wichman, PhD, who taught me to be an applied psychologist. I am grateful for their lessons.

It is also dedicated to Sheila Rao and Joann Stock, who have been spurring me onward to expand my horizons since elementary school, and to my sister, Sandy Augustin Sivinski, who has been a positive force in my life for even longer than that.

FOREWORD

BY NEIL FRANKEL, FAIA, FIIDA, AND CINDY COLEMAN

A few years ago, a friend of a friend received a coveted design award for a replacement high school within an inner-city public school system. The design press heralded the project for its bold design statement and innovative technology. For the community, the project represented a beacon of hope in this blighted neighborhood. The school board benefited too and was able to boast about bringing in a project within tight budget and schedule constraints. Does this sound like the description of a successful project? Read on.

That fall, when students filed into the new building, expectations, as you’d expect, were very high. One year later, 43 percent of the freshmen through senior classes were still reading below grade level and similar scoring deficiencies were met in math and science. The absenteeism rate among both students and faculty continued to be below state standards, and after the new car smell wore off, low student morale and high rates of vandalism were back in full swing. Does this still sound like a successful project? That depends on how you define success.

For this project team, success was defined by visual appeal and satisfaction with the team’s ability to solve issues of space planning, budget containment, and adherence to the project schedule.

This may sound like the correct response on the surface, but here’s the flaw in this way of thinking: When space planning, budget, and schedule alone become a project’s foundation, the project brief lacks ambition and depth and disregards the needs and aspirations of the people who live, work, or use a particular place. A project, no matter how aesthetically innovative, is at risk when the project goals fail to focus on issues of “user” performance.

As the late designer-provocateur Tibor Kalman was famous for saying, “The difference between good design and great design is intelligence.” Great design requires greater knowledge about the human condition and how the spaces people inhabit powers their ability to achieve success.

Had our friend’s friend envisioned a different set of goals for the school project, like improved test scores, lower absenteeism, student/faculty morale, and student aspiration, the design team’s investigation would have centered on a scientifically based understanding of environmental psychology: specifically, what physical and psychological qualities of an environment influence a student’s ability to concentrate, promote a willingness to collaborate, and communicate a sense of collegiality. These questions would have led to a more ambitious design brief and motivated higher objectives for a successful project.

Whether the project is a home, a home office, or a large institution, the process of a user-centered project is typically more collaborative. In this scenario, the makeup of the project team varies based on the specialized information and new knowledge needed for a particular project.

Along with the designers representing the design firm, and, depending on a project’s complexity, interdisciplinary experts, different user groups, and consultants may join the project to represent their specific interest, knowledge, and expertise. The project team is able to expand its role, moving beyond problem solver—addressing issues preestablished by the client—to problem identifier—participating in defining the issues with the client and identifying and applying sources of new knowledge to support and address a project-specific response.

In her book, Place Advantage: Applied Psychology for Interior Architecture, leading environmental psychologist Sally Augustin, PhD, clearly outlines a scientific approach to what she describes as “person-centered” places and demonstrates how person-centered goals will improve the predictability and reliability of the performance objectives of place.

Today, the designer’s role is more complex than ever before and there is a more prominent role for social-scientific research and new knowledge to inform the design of our built environment. The financial and resource investment of space is great, and great designers seek out sources of new knowledge, which inform the performance aspects of their design decision making.

Understanding what physical and psychological spatial strategies can and should be employed in a specific project to alter the performance of a space is key in establishing the success criteria for a project. How daylight, view, color, and spatial organization alter a user’s response and how these same issues support collaboration or promote prolonged concentration are just some of the important sources of information examined in this book.

The focus of Sally Augustin’s thesis centers on the long-standing “disconnect” between research and design practices. Neither community has been very effective in bridging the gap, and both run the risk of being irrelevant without the other. At the same time, there is a wealth of knowledge in the social-scientific community that provides new sources of information for designers to assimilate and apply.

Augustin’s expertise as a translator of the scientific principles behind environmental psychology and person-centered design liberates design-related research and new knowledge from the annals of the scientific journals and demonstrates its place in the design process. Through her effective translations of research semantics into design language, Augustin presents an accessible view into the field of design research and environmental psychology.

Place Advantage is a systemic demonstration of the power of new knowledge and research. Each chapter outlines the advantages to the design outcome and its impact on the quality of life, human behavior, and organizational performance of place.

The content of this book applies to the interests of students, design practitioners, and those who use, benefit from, and have the ambition to design spaces that allow the users of the spaces to successfully meet their objectives. This book is most relevant to those who are willing to recast the definition of a successful project to include successful user performance.

Neil Frankel

Neil Frankel is a cofounding partner along with Cindy Coleman in the Chicago-based design and consulting firm Frankel + Coleman. Prior to accepting the Fitz-Hugh Scott Endowed Chair for Design Excellence at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Neil Frankel was responsible for Skidmore, Owings & Merrill’s Chicago architectural interior practice. In addition to his academic commitment, he is one of five Fellows of both AIA and IIDA, and is a Senior Fellow of the Design Futures Council. In 2005, Mr. Frankel was the sole recipient of the AIAS Education Honor Award.

Cindy Coleman

Cindy Coleman is a cofounding partner along with Neil Frankel in the Chicago-based design and consulting firm Frankel + Coleman. Coleman is an assistant professor in the Department of Architecture, Interior Architecture and Designed Objects at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, a contributing editor for Interior Design magazine and Chicago Architect, and the professional advisor for the Marcus Prize, a biannual global architectural prize acknowledging architects at the trajectory of their careers.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book would not have come to be without the thoughtful support of its editor, John Czarnecki, and his assistant, Sadie Abuhoff. Their comments have been much appreciated.

I would also like to thank all of the groups that provided images used in this book. Its pages would be a lot less interesting and useful without their contributions. Specifically, I am grateful to

Anshen + Allen

BNIM

Fielding Nair International

HOK

Journal of Interior Design

Kahler Slater

Philips Design and Philips Healthcare

I am also glad to have had the opportunity to interview Dr. Nicholas Watkins (HOK) and George Marmaropoulus (Philips Design). I learned a lot during my conversations with them and had a wonderful time. They are both great people.

Brian Scott saved this project from technical collapse many times. He is a great designer, a great “computer geek,” and a great friend.

I have saved my thanks for Cindy Coleman and Neil Frankel till the end of this message because I hoped by the time I got here I’d have conjured up the words to thank them for writing the foreword to this book and for all their moral support. I still don’t have the words to adequately express my appreciation. Thank you, Cindy and Neil.

1OVERVIEW OF THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPERIENCE OF SPACE

Places matter. And we’re always in one.

The design of a physical place influences the mental state of the people in that space. That shapes their attitudes and behavior. Not sure how much what we sense through our eyes, ears, nose, and skin matters? Consider these scenarios:

Susan was a poor student, and her mom could never get her to do her homework. Susan fidgeted a lot while sitting at her desk, her eyes often wandered, and she would pop from her seat frequently. Then Susan’s mom changed the color of the wall behind Susan’s desk from a very saturated but not very bright Kelly green to a less-saturated light green. She set up a scent diffuser that circulates a delicate lemon scent through the space where Susan studies. Susan’s mom also lowered the light levels in the room in general and placed a task light on Susan’s desk. Now Susan gets much more of her homework done and higher grades.

Tom’s bistro was in the right part of town, and people did eat at his restaurant all the time, but they never stayed long enough to order high-margin desserts and they almost never returned to eat there a second time. Tom brought in a cooking consultant who tasted the dishes on the menu and pronounced them delicious. Then there was a plumbing leak, and the gently curving wall that ran along one side of the restaurant had to be torn out to find and repair the leak. Since money was tight, the curved wall was replaced with a straight one, although the size of the dining room remained the same. People started to order desserts and to come back for second meals at the restaurant. A waiter who had been gone during the plumbing fiasco asked Tom when he returned about how he had found the funds to expand the dining room; the space seemed more spacious now than it had in the past.

The radiation therapy treatment room at the hospital was a heavily insulated, bunker-like space. No matter what color it was painted, no one liked being there. The new director of the radiation program decided to make it more inviting by adding art: abstract images that he loved. The patients found the space even more oppressive after that. Then the new head of the hospital’s art program whisked away the abstract pictures and replaced them with landscapes featuring meadows dotted with groups of trees. After that, everyone in the radiation treatment area, patients and staff, felt a little more upbeat.

Nothing ever seemed very appetizing in the light blue dining room at Celeste’s. Leftovers always tasted great, however, in her yellow kitchen. When Celeste painted the walls of her dining room an orange-peach color and replaced her blue and white china with warmer-colored plates, food started to taste as good in the dining room when it was fresh cooked as it did when it was eaten as leftovers in the kitchen from plastic microwave-safe containers. Now the blue china is used during the post-holiday January diet season.

Students in Ms. Johnson’s third-grade class seemed to have trouble concentrating. Then a hurricane broke the glass in all the windows around the school. The new glass installed in the windows had a transparent, nonglare coating, so the heavy blinds that had been used to cut glare were taken down. Now that the students can see the natural spaces outside, everyone in Ms. Johnson’s classroom, including Ms. Johnson, has a better day.

Sean could never relax in the new bedroom space his wife designed. Sean’s wife found the bedroom a cozy retreat. The bedroom walls were papered in an intricate geometric print, and Sean’s wife kept lots of fragrant potpourri in bowls around the room. The bedside tables were made of shiny lacquered bronze, and the carpet was a nubby berber. The room was never noisy or flooded with sunlight too early in the morning. When Sean learned more about his personality, he found he was not as extraverted as his wife and that her decorating style was too intense for him. After painting the walls, reducing the amount of potpourri, and draping cloths over the top of the shiny bedside tables, Sean could relax in his bedroom.

Nobody ever seemed to have a good idea in conference room A. It didn’t seem to be a bad place—the furniture and paint were new and heavy drapes kept daylight from creating glare on the projection screen. The chairs around the conference table were comfortable to sit in. Carl thought the space could be made better, so he stepped in and redesigned it. After Carl’s efforts the room is a hotbed of creativity. The windows have been coated with a clear, nonglare film and the curtains are gone, so there is always a view to the park outside. The wide conference table has been replaced by a narrower one with a natural wood grain veneer, and the chairs around that table swivel easily so everyone at a meeting can look at anyone else. The colors are warmer now, and several intricate paintings have been hung on the walls of the room. A soundscape of classical music, with about 70 beats per minute, plays softly in the background during meetings.

These scenarios show that place design matters. They illustrate place science principles that are fundamental to the experience of physical environments. These principles can be applied in homes, schools, stores, restaurants, workplaces, healthcare facilities, and wherever else people find themselves. Everyone perceives the world around them slightly differently, but people respond to that world in consistent ways—and the exceptions to the general ways of experiencing the world can be anticipated as well.

PLAN OF THE BOOK

This book will introduce you to place science and make you Place Smart. After reading it, you will create spaces that enhance lives. Place Advantage integrates information collected through rigorous scientific research by psychologists, biologists, physicists, and other concerned professionals. This book incorporates material that anthropologists, sociologists, and designers have learned in thorough and structured investigations. Place science is a tool kit that you can use every day.

Reading this book will teach you how to create specific places that influence people in desired ways. Designing spaces is difficult because the right place is different for different people at different times doing different things. The personalities and cultures of the people who use a space influence whether place designs are successful.

Scientists have been studying how people respond psychologically to their physical environments as a separate field of research for about 40 years, although even the ancient Greeks built places like the Parthenon to create particular effects. The place scientists (also known as environmental psychologists) who have been working since the 1960s have developed a collection of theories in conjunction with their work, but not enough attention has been paid to applying the information researchers have collected—that is the focus of this book.

This book is a professional conversation with people who create places and is based on the work of many researchers. The scientific references that I think designers might be interested in reviewing are marked in the text, so interested readers can get more information. Important sources of information are listed at the end of the book. Suggested readings (marked on that list with an “S”) are also good sources of additional insights. The design implications that accompany the text are a psychologist’s recommendations to people designing interior spaces. They should be seen as basic ways in which the principles covered can be used, not the only ways they can be applied.

This book begins by introducing general principles of place science. These general principles are usually initially discussed in a residential context to make them immediately accessible to all readers—after all, we all live somewhere. Specific chapters discuss how place science can be applied in schools, healthcare facilities, retail establishments (including restaurants), homes, and offices. Since people are people, no matter where they are, there are consistencies in the material presented in each of these chapters. Designing different sorts of places twists the application of place science in new ways, however. Retailers, restaurateurs, and the people who build schools, offices, and hospitals have learned a lot about how space influences us psychologically, and they use that info every day to encourage people to buy things, eat more, learn, work effectively, and get healthy.

APPLYING PLACE SCIENCE

Applying place science is challenging. People are complicated. They are a hodgepodge of rational and irrational thoughts and emotions, so their responses to places are complicated also (Vischer 2005). To create places that enhance human lives, you need to focus on a range of details and make a lot of decisions.

Some of our responses to places are inborn (Kellert 2005). Somehow, certain sorts of experiences affect people in different parts of the world in the same way, and have for generations. Colors of a certain saturation and brightness influence the moods of human beings in predictable ways, for example (Valdez and Mehrabian 1994). Personality, which is consistent throughout our life, also influences how we interact with our physical environment. Other responses are conditioned by national culture (Altman and Gauvain 1981): everyone has the same energy level while looking at a particular shade of black, but for some people that black represents authority and for some it denotes weakness. Culture has a big influence on the size of the buffer zone or empty space that people like to maintain around themselves in various situations, for example (Hall 1982). Germans talking to one another are situated much farther from one another than Mexicans would be in the same space, talking about the same subject. We also pick up social cues about the sorts of ways we can present the aspects of our personality we want others to perceive when we personalize our surroundings. We learn and apply the associations that other members of our culture have to a pattern or smell, for example. National culture is not the only “way of doing things” designers must recognize; groups also have their own cultures and ways of communicating concepts, sometimes without words. So for members of one organization, a certain color green can be associated with an organization’s award for exceptional performance, or a wily but feared competitor.

We all have associations to things around us because of groups that we’re in, and we have additional associations and memories that influence our individual responses to the space around us. Place-related memories were very important for human survival in the past—we had to remember where camp was and where it was safe to sleep. Now each of our individualized sets of place memories influences the design of the spaces where we can thrive (Israel 2003). Accessing place memories is key to designing a successful space. These personal place memories mean that no two people will ever respond in exactly the same way to the same space.

Smells, colors, textures, and other sensory inputs can take on a special meaning for individuals. Even if a particular color of turquoise is the perfect color for the bathroom you are designing (according to what you have learned about place science), don’t paint the bathroom that color if someone who will use that space had to take a horrible-tasting cough medicine the same shade of turquoise as a child. Peppermint is generally an energizing scent, but if your mom always chewed peppermint gum when she rubbed your back as you fell asleep at night, you will find the smell of peppermint relaxing. When you want to rev up, you’ll need to smell one of the other energizing smells discussed in Chapter 5. Chapter 11 will show you how to ask questions to learn about individual sensory associations as well as a lot of other important place-related information.

Since Adler (1968), psychologists have known that for every person, there is one sense that is extra potent, that is a compelling way into his or her heart and head. It’s an individual’s dominant sense. When you are creating spaces that one or a few people will use, the dominant senses of those users should be recognized. Dominant senses help determine what information from the physical world makes its way into their psychological world, and what influence it has once it arrives. One of the surest ways to reach through the muddled stream of sensory signals around each of us, and into our emotional core, is through our dominant sense. In Chapter 7, you will learn how to identify one.

Human beings can take in a lot of information through their senses—but we can’t consciously absorb everything going on, even in a space that doesn’t seem to throw a lot of curveballs. How about this test: what does the room you’re in now smell like? Unless it’s unusual for some reason, you probably don’t know. At any time there is so much going on around us that focusing on even half of what we’re being exposed to would overwhelm us. So we all filter, and we all filter differently—we each have a set of incomplete information to use as we move forward through our world. Many of the filters we apply are woven by our cultures, which makes it easier to design spaces that will be used by more than one person, as long as all of those users have similar cultural associations. Chapter 8 discusses how national cultures should influence place design, and Chapter 7 does the same for organizational cultures.

Cultures don’t just teach us what sorts of associations we should have to sensations such as colors and smells; they also teach us rules. We each have learned the place rules for our professions, families, and neighborhood, among others. Through the rules that it teaches us, culture organizes our place experiences. Cultural systems tell us how far to stand from other people and how we should personalize the spaces we control to nonverbally communicate desired messages. Having cultural systems in place frees us up from continually needing to devote mental energy to figuring out what’s going on around us and allows us to move on to more mentally stimulating endeavors.

To apply place science successfully, you need to consider what people will be doing in any space you’re designing. A space for working on a routine task should be different from a space for brainstorming, and a space for socializing should be different from a space for meditating. You do something that doesn’t require much concentration, and something creative and something social and something spiritual, better when you are in particular mental states. With place science, you can reliably create those states.

This book illustrates how research should influence place design, but it does not lay out a simple formula for creating great spaces. To apply place science, you have to keep all the different things we’ve mentioned above (personality, organizational culture, national culture, etc.) in mind. Place Advantage provides a variety of alternatives that enhance places, but selecting from among the appropriate options for a space requires the art and skill of design. To work through an example: Saturation and brightness determine people’s psychological response to a color (more on this in Chapter 5), so there are shades of red, blue, and green that all create the same emotional effect. Different cultures also have particular associations to individual colors, and people’s personal experiences, personalities, and associations to colors lead them to prefer some more than others. Working these factors together with the amount of sunlight that enters a room, the colors of furniture that will not be replaced, and a myriad of other place-specific details and options and selecting colors for a space is the transformative, magic phase of the design process—and designers are responsible for that conjuring.

There are always several ways to design a psychological experience into a space. Having multiple tools to apply at any time means that your options for creating the places consistent with your programming objectives and exercising your creative freedom increase significantly beyond what you have learned through your previous design experience.

Place science is not only applicable to places you design but also to how you choose to live your life. You can create a portable environment that envelops you by wearing scents and specific colors. You can also pick spaces to meet where you know the place will help you achieve your objectives.

Our worlds are changing in superficial ways. Shepherds in Mongolia have yurts and Toyotas and cell phones. The same television advertisements, in the same languages, are shown in Holland, the Netherlands, and Holland, Michigan. Furniture shows in Milan influence the future design of apartments in Damascus and in Miami—although families in each place still use different criteria to plan their days and to determine whether they’ve been successful. For now. Cultural overlays on our inborn responses to place are becoming more difficult, as well as more important, to sort out.

Our place-related needs have remained much the same, even though the physical environments we find ourselves in look different than they did a few years ago. We still need to think creative thoughts sometimes, to relax at other times, and to pull dinner together. And many of us have to be really efficient about pulling that dinner together because we have many more things that we feel we need to accomplish within any 24-hour span than our grandparents did. We have the hubris to believe that our brains are evolving and that we process information in a fundamentally different way than our grandparents, but human minds and our place-related needs evolve over eons, not generations.

We’re always somewhere. Make the places you design the best places for people to live the lives they want to lead. The physical environment alone cannot make everyone’s dreams come true, but it sure can tip the scales in one direction or another.

2FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN INTERACTIONS WITH THEIR PHYSICAL WORLD

PLACE SCIENCE IN ACTION

Place science will make places you design work for the people who use them.

Place science is a discipline like physics or genetics. It uses structured thinking to establish how the place you’re in physically influences the state you are in mentally and then determines what changes (if any) need to be made in a space to achieve personal and professional objectives. Place scientists (also known as environmental psychologists) are part psychologist, part biologist, part architect, part interior designer, and part sociologist, sometimes with a smattering of physicist, chemist, or anthropologist thrown in. Place science is not feng shui.

Place scientists have systematically gathered information about human responses to colors, smells, textures, furniture arrangements, ceiling heights, sounds, shapes, and just about anything else we find around us. They answer questions such as the following:

How and why does ceiling height matter?

How does personality influence the kinds of places in which people flourish?

Are there some sorts of physical environments in which people are more creative than others?

How should color be used in place design? How should national culture influence color selections?

When Asians and North Americans look at a scene, what does each group see?

What sorts of landscape views are most refreshing?

How will (or should) places be different in the years ahead?

Scientific research by place scientists has documented patterns in how we interact with our world. After they uncover these patterns in how humans respond to spaces, place scientists can apply this information, collaborating with people designing places and products. For example, place scientists work with furniture manufacturers to determine how wide conference room tables should be, with architects to determine how large the conference room holding that table should be, with interior designers to identify the appropriate colors for the walls of that conference room, and with homeowners who want to make their home office as productive as that conference room.

Today’s place scientists are solving the same problems that people creating experiences have been grappling with since antiquity, only they are able to apply information garnered through modern science. Ancient Greek temples are perfectly balanced but large, so that the gods seem serene and all-powerful. The Greeks who built those ancient temples used many principles modern place scientists would suggest. In medieval times, fanfares and battle music triggered an emotional response—fanfares were awe-inspiring, and battle music could convince listeners to go out and kill people. Modern place scientists also think a lot about emotional responses to sound. Traditionally, royalty sits on elevated chairs so that their subjects need to look up to them, which royalty and place scientists know leads to a respectful attitude. Hitler knew just how to use music, color, and space design to inspire awe and respect—but so did the ancient Mayans. Marie Antoinette famously created a farmhouse on the grounds of Versailles so that she could live there from time to time and experience a lifestyle that was more relaxed and less complex than that of the royal court. Modern researchers studying mentally refreshing spaces would approve many of her design decisions.

SOUVENIRS FROM OUR LIVES ON THE SAVANNA

The long period human beings spent living on the savanna in our prehistory explains many of our responses to the information we collect through our senses (Appleton 1975; Kellert 2005; Heerwagen and Gregory 2008; Hildebrand 1999; Wilson 1984). Humans are relatively small, weak, and defenseless compared to lions and rhinos, and we seem to have developed some ingrained reactions to particular experiences to make up for our lack of physical prowess. For example, we hate sitting with our backs to an open space, such as a door, through which danger could approach, and we prefer to sleep in higher spaces in a building. Bedrooms on the second floor are less accessible than those on the ground floor.

The physical sensations we experience influence our lives in many ways that are consistent with our evolutionary past:

We score higher on tests when we’re in the same mood we were in when we learned the material being tested (because we’re smelling the same scent, for example) or when we take them in the same room in which we learned the material—unconsciously we use clues in the physical environment, things we were looking at, etc., when we are being taught something to help us remember the material being tested or to at least put us in the same mood (which helps us remember) (Eich 1995; Wise and Hazzard 2000). On the savanna, this sort of place- or mood-specific learning would have been useful.

Warm colors attract us, which is why the back walls of stores are often painted red or orange—they draw us in past all the merchandise, to the back of the store (Bellizzi, Crowley, and Hasty 1983). Once we get to the back of the store, we turn around and start to move through products as we return to the front of the store. This path through a store exposes us to a larger number of items for sale than we would otherwise encounter. Ancient fires cast warm light and drew us closer.

We like sitting in places that seem like refuges, spaces in which the ceilings are lower and the light is dimmer, which are physically adjacent to an area which is brighter and has higher ceilings (Hildebrand 1999). This attraction to spaces that offer refuge and prospect makes good sense evolutionarily. It explains why we like to live in sheltered spots on the edges of parks, golf courses, and lakes. Having a connection with a brighter and more expansive surrounding area also explains why we like to be able to open the windows. Although both men and women enjoy a setting with prospect and refuge, women prefer a layout with a little more refuge than prospect and men prefer more prospect than refuge.

We enjoy being in dappled light (Wise and Hazzard 2000). Dappled light is the kind of light we experience when sitting under a plane tree on a sunny day. Plane trees are plentiful on the savanna. In dappled light, dollops of sunlight and darker areas speckle the ground immediately around us, and the lighting is brighter and more uniform beyond that area. We probably enjoy dappled light because during our ancient past when we were experiencing it, we were relaxed because the weather was good and because we had a quick means of escape (up the tree casting those irregular shadows) if we saw danger approaching.

We also like patterns on wallpapers and cubicle walls not to be too complicated (Rodemann 1999). Approaching trouble would have been easier to spot against backdrops such as simpler wallpapers.

Today, no matter where in the world you ask the question, more people will tell you that their favorite color is blue than any other color. How come? When we were living on the savanna, blue meant good things. Fresh water when seen from a distance is blue. A sky during pleasant weather is blue.

Even though our responses to many current situations are based on what was good for us during our evolutionary past, mysteries remain about why we respond to particular aspects of our surroundings in certain ways:

Why is it that if we smell jasmine after we fall asleep, we think at a higher level the next day?

Why does the color yellow so intensely please some people looking at it and so intensely displease another set of people?

Why is information recall and problem solving better under warm-hued light than cooler-hued light?

Why do our hearts start to beat in time to regularly paced sounds around us?

All of our psychological reactions can’t be explained by our evolutionary past, but as you plan spaces, think of our days on the savanna whenever you’re confused. This can help you decide whether you should create a beige space (no—the totally unnatural experience of being in a space with only white or beige walls, upholstery, and flooring is so alien that it sends us into a distressing, self-centered funk [Mahnke 1996]) or one with plenty of cabinets to hide possessions (yes—clutter makes us tense, as our eyes need to scan it continuously to make sure that it has not changed in a way that requires our attention—just as we would have scanned surrounding brush when we lived on the savanna) or one with daylight (yes—that helps us regulate our circadian rhythms—when they’re upset, we’re stressed). If an intelligent but relatively weak and defenseless animal wouldn’t want to be in a space, neither would modern humans.

DESIGN EXPERIENCE AND RESPONSES TO PLACES

At a fundamental level places affect how effectively we live our lives. For example, we learn best when our minds are alert but our bodies aren’t. A room that is not brightly lit relaxes us; task lighting focuses us mentally on the lit material. A generally darker room with task lighting will therefore be a better place to study than a uniformly and brightly lit room. We’re in the mood to eat when we’re looking at warm-colored things. We’re creative, as well as more cooperative and helpful, when the space around us puts us in a positive mood (Cote 1999). We can concentrate when there’s nothing going on around us that shows potential of being interesting to us, but not when we’re sitting in the middle of a big room surrounded by other people who may say something intriguing at any time—whether we can see them or not.

Place-design experiences or training influences our perception of desirable and effective places. Space designers experience places differently than people without all of the training that they have received (Wilson 1996). People with place design experience and training, for example, find a broader color palette acceptable than the general population. For example, designers are much more apt to find yellow-yellow-green desirable than the general population. The same yellow-yellow-green that designers relish is among the colors most disliked by the population at large. Designers need to respect the different color preferences of members of the general public and not specify that yellow-yellow-green be used in spaces that they are designing. The general public’s right to dislike this color is just as valid as designers’ enjoyment of the color. Designers also like to be in spaces designed in a more contemporary style, as compared to nondesigners, who like to be in spaces with more traditional styling—put people into traditional environments if that’s where they’ll be comfortable.

Always respect the people who will play on the sets that you create. Although personality, organizational culture, national culture, and design experience influence the specifics of how people respond to a space, all people are fundamentally the same when it comes to how they want to interact with the world around them. All people like spaces where they feel comfortable, secure, and valued. They like spaces that meet their functional needs—if they are cooking, they need a heating element; if they are doing thoughtful work, they need to be able to concentrate on that work. It is important for place designers to recognize the importance of the universal set of human needs that will be satisfied in the spaces they create and to acknowledge and value the various orientations that space users can have to a space.

Place alone does not determine who has a good day or a bad day, but places can tip the scales toward a good day or a bad day. A place with certain features can’t guarantee that things will always work out there the way you intend, but it can make an experience much more likely. Changing the physical environment can guide people toward inspiration and tranquility, companionship and privacy, delight and comfort, freedom and strength.

Tausende von E-Books und Hörbücher

Ihre Zahl wächst ständig und Sie haben eine Fixpreisgarantie.

Sie haben über uns geschrieben: