Professor Studies How People Feel about Their Environment

Oladele Ogunseitan, a social ecology professor at the University of California at Irvine, who is also a microbiologist, has been studying topophilia, topo meaning region or place, and philia “tendency towards.” Topophilia was apparently coined by Yi-Fu Tuan, a geographer at the University of Wisconsin. He defined it as a person's “mental, emotional and cognitive ties to a place.”

Prof. Ogunseitan's research article was published in the February journal of Environmental Health Perspectives. His hypothesis was that “individual preferences for specific ecosystem components and restorative environments are significantly associated with quality of life.” He asked 379 people on the UC Irvine campus to rate features in the urban landscape and their sense well-being, measured by the WHO's “Quality of Life” survey.

Ogunseitan identified four categories of topophilia: “ecodiversity” (the presence of nature's elements); “synesthetic tendency” (colors, smells, and other sensory stimuli); “environmental familiarity” (such factors as spaciousness and privacy); and “cognitive challenge” (structural complexity and textures, as in buildings). The study group found flowers and bodies of water the most enhancing for their mental well being; buildings or complex designs were not judged so.

Ogunseitan believes these types of assessments can assist urban planners and landscape designers.

Source: Ogunseitan O. Topophilia and the Quality of Life. Environmental Health Perspectives Volume 113, Number 2, February 2005.

A full version of this abstract is available for free in HTML or PDF formats at:

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/docs/2005/113-2/toc.html