Inquiry By Design – John Zeisel (1)

But it may also lead quickly to fruitful insights, because not to use an available space is quite a strange thing to do. Adaptations for Use When some people find that their physical environment does not accommo- date something they want to do, they change it; they become designers. Some professional designers try to predetermine as little as they can in buildings and other facilities so that residents have the greatest opportunity to join in design by adapting the setting the way they want (Habraken, 1972; Turner, 1972; Wam- pler, 1968).

At the other extreme are designers who try to plan for everything they think will occur—from built-in furniture to the color of curtains. The former is called “loose-fit design,” the latter “tight-fit.”” But no matter what the original designer wants or expects, people who use environments redesign them. Re- searchers and professional designers can learn a great deal from this adaptive redesigning.

Adaptive traces are significant for designers because they are direct man- ifestations of design by users. They take place in the fuzzy area between what professional designers and lay designers do. Such traces are difficult to interpret, but one does not have to estimate whether they will lead to action, as one does with attitudes. People change settings to better support activities: to facilitate and sustain them.

They may remove inappropriate props, such as built-in lights that are unadjustable, or add new ones, such as a backyard barbecue pit to make eating out easier. For the same ends, they can alter the relations among settings— creating both new connections and separations, such as windows and walls. Props. When users add things to or remove things from a setting, they create new opportunities for activity. Inasmuch as the things support activities, we can think of them as staging props purposefully arranged by users: a wood- burning stove installed in someone’s apartment living room; play equipment added to an empty lot to change it into a playground.

Props New props may have been added because users or uses have changed or because certain activities were overlooked or considered unaffordable in original designs.

To Evan, Elizabeth, and Eva Published by the Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 I1RP 32 East 57th Street, New York, NY 10022, USA 296 Beaconsfield Parade, Middle Park, Melbourne 3206, Australia © 1981 by Wadsworth, Inc., Belmont, California 94002 © Cambridge University Press 1984 First published 1981 by Wadsworth, Inc. First published by Cambridge University Press 1984 Printed in the United States of America ISBN 0 521 31971 4 SERIES FOREWORD The study of environment and behavior has shown a rapid development in recent decades, we expect that interest in this field will continue at a high level in the future.

As a young and informative area, it has many exciting qualities. For example, the analysis of the relationship between human behavior and the physical environment has attracted researchers from many fields in the social sciences, such as psychology, sociology, geography, and anthropology, and from the environmental design fields, such as architecture, urban and regional planning, and interior design.

The multidisciplinary character of this field has led to an atmosphere of stimulation, cross-fertilization, and, yes, even confu- sion and difficulty in communication. Furthermore, because of the diversity in intellectual styles and goals of its participants, research on environment and behavior has as often dealt with applied, real-world problems of environmental design as it has treated basic and theoretical issues. These factors, coupled with the relatively young stage of development of the field, led us to believe that a series of short books on different areas of the environment and behavior field would be useful to students, researchers, and practitioners.

Our view was that the study of environment and behavior had not yet firmed up to the point that a single volume would do justice to the wide range of topics now being studied or to the variety of audiences interested in the field. Furthermore, it became clear to us that new topical areas have emerged over the past decade and that some vehicle is necessary to facilitate the evolutionary growth of the field. For these reasons, Brooks/Cole established the present series of books on environment and behavior with the following goals in mind: first, we endeav- ored to develop a series of short volumes on areas of research and knowledge that are relatively well established and are characterized by a reasonably sub- stantial body of knowledge.

Second, we have recruited authors from a diversity of disciplines who bring to bear a variety of perspectives on various subjects in the field. Third, we asked authors not only to summanize research and knowl- edge on their topic but also to set forth a ‘‘point of view,”’ if not a theoretical orientation, in their book.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 245a9de7dcd8fb38
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 14,863,519 bytes (14.175 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• ISBN: 0521319714
• Pages: 275
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 472.89 minutes
• Total Words: 94,579
• Total Characters: 612,017
• Average Words per Page: 343.92
• Average Characters per Page: 2225.52

Most Frequent Words

research (601), design (581), people (435), one (292), use (286), example (245), questions (238), researchers (226), data (226), designers (217), behavior (206), new (202), chapter (191), way (183), respondents (181), used (172), residents (168), physical (166), study (157), problem (157), want (157), see (156), information (152), make (135), know (132), like (132), problems (131), between (128), investigators (123), also (121), find (120), e-b (120), traces (120), different (119), another (119), behavioral (117), situation (117), knowledge (116), decisions (116), housing (116), setting (114), settings (114), social (113), methods (113), two (112), effects (110), useful (109), others (109), hypotheses (109), group (104), analysis (103), environment (102), groups (101), time (101), building (100), project (100), place (98), particular (97), environments (97), many (96), room (94), results (93), environmental (91), using (91), things (91), zeisel (88), process (86), test (84), school (83), often (82), interview (82), control (82), observing (81), among (80), places (80), well (79), types (79), public (78), focused (77), help (76), important (74), plan (72), whether (71), activities (70), describe (70), feel (70), first (69), side (69), answers (69), question (69), areas (68), situations (68), personal (67), york (67), topics (67), able (67), responses (67), made (67), part (66), change (66).

PDF Download