Unit 7 - Our Cities and Communities Flashcards
How have neighborhoods been defined?
Using tools of assessment, environmental psychologists have identified three types of neighborhoods in particular.
The integral neighborhood has much face-to-face interaction, much cohesiveness from neighborhood support of local interest and values, and much participation in organizations outside the neighborhood.
The parochial neighborhood is like the integral neighborhood except that it has fewer ties to outside organizations; it is inward facing and may even discourage participation in the wider community.
The anomic neighborhood has little face-to-face contact, little identification, and few ties to the outside world.
How is neighborhood satisfaction measured?
One way satisfaction is measured is to ask about the extent of positive social relations in the neighborhood, the clarity of the symbolic interactions (clashing meanings lead to confusion and dissension), and strong attachment to the neighborhood.
Another view holds that neighborhood satisfaction is composed of residents’ satisfaction with the neighborhoods physical condition, political climate, convenience (access to schools etc.), and social relations.
A third approach consists of a formal checklist of the perceived quality of neighborhoods. It includes 19 perceived residential environment quality indicators, each with 3 or 4 items.
Summarize the four types of factors that influence neighbourhood satisfaction:
personal factors
physical factors
social and security factors
cultural factors
Personal Factors : Satisfaction depends on when it matches personal preference, when they feel at home, improved over their former neighborhood, confidence in neighborhood, adaption to stimulation, resources suited to the environment, ownership vs. renting (owners are more satisfied), stage of life, personality-like factors (urbanophiles vs. ubranophobes), and age.
Physical Factors : Satisfaction is influence by natural elements (they are preferred), openness, quietness, absence of pollution, less industry, well-maintained, more ornate structures then plain (for younger people anyway), not mixed with commercial infrastructure, more visual diversity without too much height, and are aesthetically pleasant.
Walkability (the extent which a neighborhood has pleasant and interesting paths to walk) increases satisfaction.
Newness and smaller projects are generally more pleasing.
Social and Security Factors : Social ties are only important to those who strongly value social ties within a neighborhood.
Safety fears are a key cause of community satisfaction, with fears including : possible traffic accidents for children, and widespread fear of crime - fear of crime is affected by density.
Those who feel safer are more satisfied.
Cultural Factors : Satisfaction is presumably a congruence between the resident’s culture, the era with which they identify, and the physical form of the community.
Religious buildings seem to have near-universal meanings and can increase satisfaction with ones community.
Social ties are usually or ultimately are less important than the physical qualities of the community for most residents.
How is urbanization related to mental health? How can you explain this relationship?
Those who live closer to industries have more mental health problems than other residents. Poor-quality neighborhoods influence depression beyond the effects of poverty itself.
Urbanization may generally have a negative impact on mental health. Between 1880 and 1963, a direct regional correlation was found between schizophrenia and urbanization in the United States.
In Netherlands, the incidence of psychosis increases with the closer a person lives to downtown.
Explanations:
-The drift hypothesis asserts that people who already have problems migrate into cities, as opposed to the hypothesis that stressors encountered in the city are the cause of their problems.
One study showed that movers away from a bad neighborhood had better mental health then those who did not.
One model of the connection between the physical design of a community and mental health proposes that the following features may be especially important in causing mental health problems: high density, through streets, poor upkeep of public places, a lack of community meeting places, and high-rise residences, i.e. environmental stressors.
Assess the concept of defensible space as a way to reduce vandalism and crime in communities.
Areas with defensible space usually have less crime, but defensible spaces do not always reduce residents fear of crime.
-public spaces are generally more vulnerable
Changes to the environment that increased surveillance, traffic control, and neighborhood logo’s reduced crime by 26% in one community.
However, some areas with defensible space have serious crime problems anyway. Because the space may not actually be defended even if it has good surveillance, the neighborhood may not actually come together to do something.
Defensible space sets the stage for crime reduction by making it easier, almost automatic, for residents to fight crime through visual surveillance of outdoor areas, but if residents are unable or unwilling to act on what they see, crime will not be deterred.
A second reason that defensible space does not guarantee a crime-free neighborhood is that not all criminals pay attention to the environment. Less-experienced criminals motivated by thrill seeking, social approval, or under the influence of drugs and alcohol use less rational criteria for choosing a target and may simply not pay attention to defensible space features of the setting.
Defensible space features may be more successful for a particular building rather then entire community.
How is high temperature related to antisocial behavior?
Antisocial behavior tends to rise does tend to rise with temperature. -especially violent crime
However, crime may fall when temperature is very high.
Summarize the relationship in the city between helpfulness and weather, noise, and density.
People are more helpful on nicer days (such as warmer winter days and cooler summer days)
Loud noise generally makes people less helpful but may also facilitate more extreme impression formation.
Higher density/bystanders generally decreases helping behavior.
Women are more likely then men to be helpful when population density is high and complex. However men may be more helpful in plainer environments.
Summarize research findings about everyday behaviors in a community.
Three different kinds of monitoring often occur within the city.
Low-walkability of an area is related to obesity
-the larger the population the faster people walk
Walks generally follow planned patterns
Those who hung out more had more civic engagement
Elderly men hang out in malls the most
Stanley Milgram found that many people were able to identify familiar strangers at a bus stop, and these people were often thought about and a appeared to be endeared.
Describe how various features of a retail environment may influence consumers’ behaviors.
Buying a environmental product may actually predict may reduce the buying of other such products.
People are more likely to shop at locations closest to them and locations which are the largest, although they may outshop if the product is especially attractive.
People are less friendly in boxlike supermarkets rather then farmers markets.
People will more likely go down a longer aisle and will be more likely to impulse buy, whereas short aisles may just be gazed at.
People spend more time shopping and enjoy it more in pleasant environments.
Feelings of crowding lead to dissatisfaction and leaving the store earlier then planned, and negative attitude toward the store.
Less interaction in urban environments,
Buying is increased when products are at eye level
Cleanliness effects buying behavior
Products at the ends of the aisle will be bought more but may decrease exploration and overall buying behavior.
Speed of music correlates with walking, however slower music and therefore walking speed increases buying.
People are more likely to buy a product when scents are coherent with that product.
How has environmental psychology been used to improve community design?
Renovations of low-income housing and following principles of defensible space by :
(1) Assigning as much public space as possible to the control of specific families, using both substantial and symbolic fencing.
(2) reducing the number of pedestrian routes through the project and improved lighting along the paths
(3) improved the projects image and encouraged a sense of personal ownership by resurfacing the dwellings and giving different colors to individual dwellings
Increase pride in dwellings reduced serious crimes by 61.5%, and increased felt right to talk with strangers.
Plaza’s may be more effective for sociability (positive social interactions) and use when they have appropriate amenities such as (seating arrangement and water fountains) and are located in busy areas.
Also, activities to watch are beneficial.
