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What we know and understand about our surroundings influences our evaluations of and behaviors in the physical environment. In addition, our reasons for using places, our goals and personal plans, bias the manner in which we acquire and store knowledge of places. The extent to which places afford the goals and plans we bring to them also affects environmental assessments. How much we like a place is colored by how well it meets certain functional objectives. Yet scholarly analysis of each of these topics has proceeded largely in isolation. The principal objective of this volume is to promote more thinking and analysis about the integration of these three, heretofore largely distinct areas of scholarly inquiry-namely environmental cognition, environmental assessment, and decision making and action in real-world situations. We are not attempting a broad theoretical integration across the many realms of human-environment studies as outlined for example in The Handbook of Environmental Psychology (Stokols & Altman, 1987). Throughout the present volume there is a distinctly cognitive bias, emphasizing the role of cognition as it influences assessment and action rather than studying how action or assessment might impact cognition. This cognitive perspective reflects the editors’ own intellectual training (experimental psychology) and also mirrors the current predominant view within each of the three areas of inquiry we investigate. However, as we discuss throughout this volume, this cognitive perspective may detract from a fuller understanding of how and in what way people interrelate with their physical surroundings (see also Saegert & Winkel, 1990, for a sociocultural critique of the cognitive perspective in environmental psychology). Furthermore, we focus our analysis of cognition, assessment, and action at the individual level rather than aggregating responses intended to characterize the environment at a societal or group level. Given that the principal objective of this volume is to promote integration across three areas of scholarship that have operated largely in isolation from one another, we begin by first describing each of these three main areas of inquiry. This is followed by a brief analysis of some preliminary attempts at integration. We conclude with a description of how the present volume is organized.

Research in environmental cognition has been fragmented into at least three related but separate areas that reflect different purposes, viewpoints, and disciplinary conventions (Evans and Gärling, this volume). One tradition has focused on predicting spatial choices such as choosing shops or modes of transportation (Timmermans, this volume). A second tradition, driven in part by the necessity to make value judgments about settings to be spared or modified in development, has focused on the assessment of environments, and particularly on the visual quality of natural settings (R. Kaplan, this volume). Finally, a third tradition, coming principally from psychology and geography, has focused on exploring the content and structure of mental representations of the environment (Golledge, this volume). In this chapter we discuss these three approaches to environmental cognition and examine how they can contribute to each other and to a more general view of action, evaluation, and cognition. We focus specifically on the linkages between the physical environment, cognitive mediators, and outcomes such as wayfinding, decision making, and other actions. We pay particular attention to how the environment and mediators are represented. This chapter is organized into several sections. After the introduction, we review the chapters in this volume by Timmermans, R. Kaplan, and Golledge. Unlike much previous work in evaluation and in spatial decision making, all three authors discuss the cognitive processes that mediate between environment and behavior. The following section considers alternative approaches to cognitive mediators such as mental models and schemas. Following this, we briefly examine how the physical setting has been represented in environmental cognition. We then turn to computational models that attempt to provide rigorous definitions of both environment and mediator. Next, we propose our own preliminary schema-based model of wayfinding. Finally, we suggest some questions for further research. In artificial intelligence research a distinction is made between two alternative approaches to theory: “scruffy” and “neat” (Luger & Stubblefield, 1989). Whereas researchers following both traditions are interested in simulating human cognitive behavior, the scruffies primarily focus on producing a computational system where the outcomes mimic human behavior.

Environmental assessment has been defined as “a general conceptual and methodological framework for describing and predicting how attributes of places relate to a wide range of cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses” (Craik & Feimer, 1987). A primary purpose for assessing environments is to provide valid and reliable information that has utility in environmental planning, design, and management decision making. Implicit in the assessment activity is the assumption of identifiable relationships of physical environmental factors with descriptive and evaluative assessments, and with predictions of responses to places conceptualized in plans and designs, but not yet built. This chapter addresses the utility of research findings. Three primary questions are posed. Why are some environmental assessment and cognition research findings used successfully in decision making while others are not? What factors contribute to these outcomes? And how important are physical environmental factors in planning, design, and management decision making? The preceding chapters by Rachel Kaplan, Reginald Golledge, and Harry Timmermans provide the background for the following discussion. The first section of this chapter presents a brief review of similarities and differences among the three preceding chapters, with specific attention directed to interpretations or definitions of the concepts of assessment and preference, the use of physical environmental variables in the assessment process, and the roles of laypersons and experts in assessment. Potential uses for and applications of environmental assessment research are described in the second section. This is followed by a discussion of the differences between instrumental and conceptual applications and of factors that have been identified as influencing applications, factors such as communications between researchers and users, responsibilities for problem definition, and the context within which the research is conducted. This chapter concludes with a discussion of the opportunities for and probable limitations on applications of the preceding chapters by R. Kaplan, Golledge, and Timmermans. Four concepts and elements that are addressed in the three chapters have been selected for purposes of structuring a comparison among them. These concepts and elements—assessment, preference, roles of laypersons and experts, and physical environmental factors—are particularly salient to the issue of research applications.

This chapter deals with the question of how adults process information about large-scale physical features and their spatial relations during navigation between places. The presentation is based on the presumption that single acts of cognition are comparatively unimportant in real-life travel. Accordingly, sequential relations between acts are emphasized, which is the reason for the term event in the title. In general, ways of seeing how spatial cognition is organized in time and space should further the search for connections between the fields of spatial cognition, environmental assessment and action. However, the latter prospect is beyond the scope of this chapter. The aim-to make explicit the sequence aspect of cognitive acts in several problem areas of spatial cognition—is pursued in a spirit of inductive analysis in that a number of act sequences are discussed as examples of important spatial cognition events. The approach is first described in broad outline. Processing of large-scale spatial information may entail different theoretical perspectives on levels of mental functioning. Basic mechanisms and operations that underlie the occurrence of cognitive acts represent one level, being the main focus of contemporary theory construction and model building. Further, cognitive acts are reflected in conscious activity and self-consciousness, which represent a second level. Finally, a third level emerges to the extent that cognitive acts are reliably ordered continuously in time and space. Common categories of acts in large-scale spatial cognition are perceptual identification, encoding, recognition, and recall of environmental information, judgments of topological, projective, and metric spatial relations, spatial inference, visual-spatial imagery, and spatial choice. Detailed processing underlying these cognitive acts is progressively unraveled by means of refined task paradigms, deductive reasoning, mathematics, and procedures for controlling subjects’ behavioral and mental activities. This kind of knowledge is sparse in the field of large-scale spatial cognition (Pick, 1985). Independent variables in experiments have been related as often to issues of development, the structure of location information in cognitive maps, methodology, or application as to the nature of processing per se (cf. Evans, 1980). In the long run, theory about underlying processing is indispensible for any of these concerns, including the event approach to be presented here.

The study of how people make decisions has long been dominated by the economic man or rationality model. In recent years researchers have extended the study of decision making into the spatial context. Given the pervasive role of the rationality model it was not surprising to see reliance on it in this new domain as well (Golledge & Timmermans, 1987; Timmermans, this volume). There are, however, at least two reasons why one might have hoped for a broader perspective. First, given its obvious kinship to the area of environmental cognition, research on spatial decision making could have reflected the concern for cognitive structure central to the wayfinding literature. Second, the rationality model has increasingly been the subject of searching questions and criticism. Cracks have been appearing in the once near-monolithic support for this model. A number of psychologists have been quite articulate about what they see as serious deficiencies in this approach (Einhorn & Hogarth, 1985; Hermstein & Mazur, 1987; Kruglanski & Ajzen, 1983; Simon, 1957; Wallach & Wallach, 1983). Even economists have expressed serious reservations (Bell & Kristol, 1981; Earl, 1983a; Eichner, 1983; Kuttner, 1985; Lutz, 1987). Decision theorists have not been insensitive to these concerns; many modifications have been proposed (see Jungermann, 1983, for an extensive review). If there is a consensus among them, it is far from obvious. In the absence of such a consensus, many stalwart investigators (including economists and planners) continue within the comfortable and familiar confines of the classical framework. In the discussion that follows, the term “rationality” will be used to refer to the classical rationality position that still endures in many quarters, and that still serves as a center of gravity for the multitude of dissatisfied revisionists. In its simplest form, the position can be summarized as stating that people have perfect knowledge and that they strive to maximize their gains. A most interesting analysis of the increasingly obvious inadequacy of the rationality model and of how planners are coping with this state of affairs is provided by E.R. Alexander (1984). The picture he paints is essentially one of a paradigm decline, with heroic efforts on the part of practitioners to carry on nonetheless.

Before trying to analyze environmental assessment throughout the life span, let us briefly consider what environmental assessment means. Craik (1971), for instance, distinguishes five kinds of place assessment: physical and spatial properties of places, number and variety of artifacts in a place, traits of places, behaviors typically occurring in a place, and institutional attributes or social climate of places. In general, models of environmental assessment can be considered place centered, while environmental appraisal relates more to observer-centered variables. Gifford (1987) stresses how environmental appraisal refers to different personal impressions, such as descriptions, evaluations, emotional reactions, meanings, and attitudes of concern. In his recent review of environmental psychology, Holahan (1986) includes under assessment studies relating to the affective appraisal of the environment (Russell & Lanius, 1984), place evaluation envisioned in terms of the degree to which a place is seen as helping to achieve goals (Canter, 1983), the cognitive components in environmental assessment and the “supporting environment”—that is, an environment in which the information necessary for making decisions is readily available and interpretable (Kaplan, 1982), preferences for places and their attractiveness (Nasar, 1983; Zube & Pitt, 1981), residential satisfaction and neighborhood attachment (Fried, 1982; Galster & Hesser, 1981), and identification of standards of quality for various settings (Craik, 1981). Thus environmental assessment includes a variety of factors and/or of processes, ranging from the mere perception of a place to affective/emotional evaluations of it. Even if all of the components of assessment are relevant, not all of them will be considered here. We will focus mainly on cognitive aspects of environmental assessment. This means perception, cognitive evaluation, affective/emotional evaluation, and preference for places. These aspects are all interrelated to the concept of “place schema” (we will use “schema” when referring to one single schema, and “schemata” when referring to the plural). A place schema is abstract and hierarchically organized knowledge about places. Perception of a place can be viewed as the mere fact of coming into contact with a setting through the senses. Perception may also include the categorization and/or the conceptualization of a place, and it can also mean to form or use place schemata.

The purpose of this chapter is to provide a review of past research and theory in environmental cognition from the perspective of life-span developmental psychology, to suggest future directions for work in this area, and to lay the groundwork for questions of application that are discussed elsewhere in this volume. Before it is possible to address these goals, however, it is essential to establish what is meant by “a life-span developmental approach to environmental cognition.” The first section of the chapter is thus devoted to a discussion of these definitional issues. The second section provides a selective review of past research. The research has been chosen to illustrate how changes in individual development in a variety of domains (e.g., development of logical classification skills in the cognitive domain, or development of interpersonal attachment in the socioemotional domain) may have consequences for environmental cognition. The review of past work leads to the observation that most research has focused on how environmental cognition is derived from direct experience in environments. It is argued that another extremely influential source of environmental cognition is through exposure to representations of environments. Thus, the final section of the chapter contains discussions of the roles of environmental representations for environmental cognition, and descriptions of some recent research in this area. In the original conceptualization of the conference on which this volume is based, Evans and Gärling (1987) defined environmental cognition as … the processes involved in the perception and cognition of spatial information in the real world. Most of this research has not examined preference or evaluation. Instead the focus has been primarily on understanding the cognitive processes themselves and how they are influenced by person variables (e.g. age, gender, familiarity) and by environmental variables such as landmarks, path structures, or overall organizational factors, (p. 2) … This definition works well for the purpose intended, that is, for distinguishing environmental cognition from environmental assessment, on the one hand, and from decision making and action, on the other. In part, these distinctions are congruent with a taxonomy developed earlier (Liben, 198la), which similarly placed environmental cognition in a broader context.

In this chapter, I sketch an integrated account of environmental assessment, cognition, and action throughout the individual’s life span. Zimring and Gross (this volume) have already described how the schema is structured to include all three aspects; Canter (this volume) has extended this to stress the social context of meanings and actions in which these schema operate; and this chapter accepts and develops their positions. What further can a life-span approach add to the arguments advanced in these earlier integrative chapters? Liben (this volume) has already stated the case most powerfully with respect to her topic, environmental cognition; and it can as easily be applied to evaluation and action. A life-span approach enables development to be put in context: what earlier stages have so far equipped the individual to do, what the demands of the current situation are on the individual, and how variations at the present stage can affect later development. Taking this developmental perspective throws the emphasis on process and on the adaptive nature of the environmental schema for the particular life stage reached by the individual. As such, the perspective provides a test bed for examining the range of theoretical relationships between affect, cognition, and action in the environment advanced in earlier chapters. The life-span approach can also serve to reintroduce into the field a sense of the importance of individual differences, and continuities of individuality through life, which is conspicuously missing from many of the earlier chapters. The developmental tradition within psychology has not, as a whole, stressed individual differences as much as has done the life-span developmental. The life-span perspective has been much concerned with continuities and developments within the individual, as goals and tasks change over the life course. Much mainstream “developmental” research lacks this sense of continuity, being often presented as a series of snapshots of the typical child at different ages or stages. In contrast, the life-span approach, as Liben’s chapter reminds us, emphasizes the processes whereby developments occur, and conceptualizes this development as affected by biological changes, psychological development, changes in the individual’s social role and context, cultural forces, and historical changes during the individual’s life span.

This chapter addresses the question of how research on environmental assessment, cognition, and action can be utilized in the professional arenas of public policy, urban planning, and architectural design. Initially a discussion on three papers (Chapters 12, 13, and 14), the chapter attempts to extrapolate policy and design implications for the built environment from current knowledge on life-span developmental issues as represented by these three chapters. Suggestions of other research questions, issues, and strategies that might better inform policy and design are then discussed. In conclusion, the chapter briefly explores six general issues about the interaction of environmental cognition and research utilization. The contributions to this volume by Giovanna Axia, Erminielda Mainardi Peron, and Maria Rosa Baroni, by Lynn Liben, and by Roger Hart and Michael Conn have dealt heavily with child development and very little with aging or life-span development. Little evidence is presented from the gerontological and geriatric literatures, and less from the life-span literature. Liben presents a clear conceptualization of lifespan developmental approaches to environmental cognition, but to date there have been few studies and thus no data specifically on life-span developmental changes in environmental cognition. My chapter, therefore, will be weighted most heavily on the earlier phases of human development though, where feasible, it will comment on implications for the environment of elderly adults and on the environmental context of life-span developmental changes. Despite their titles and intentions, the three chapters focus most heavily on environmental cognition and much less on assessment and action. For example, after discussing the wide variety of possible definitions of assessment, including appraisal, evaluation, preferences, and attachment. Axia et al. focus most heavily on the cognitive aspects of schemata, representation, and organization of knowledge. Similarly, Hart and Conn valiantly take on the challenge of reporting on children's decision making and environmental behavior, but their empirical examples are also limited to cognitive and metacognitive issues. My chapter will thus also focus on environmental knowing. There are many interesting points of a theoretical and conceptual nature to raise about environmental assessment, cognition, and action from these three chapters, but this task is left to the other commentary chapter by Christopher Spencer.