THE CONTEXT OF ARCHITECTURE IN THE HUMAN ENVIRONMENT

PROXEMICS

The study of the symbolic and communicative role of the spatial individuals maintain in various
social and interpersonal situations, and how the nature and degree of this spatial arrangement
relates to environmental and cultural factors.

The interrelated observations and theories of man’s use of space as a specialized elaboration of
culture.

CULTURE AS COMMUNICATION

CULTURE
The integrated pattern of human knowledge, beliefs, and behavior built up by a group of human
beings and transmitted from one generation to the next.

COMMUNICATION
The expression, conveyance, or interchange of ideas, information, or the like by writing, speaking,
or through a common system of signs or symbols, especially in a way that is clearly and readily
understood.

LANGUAGE
The human speech and all words used by a people. Also, any means of expressing thought. It is a
major element in the formation of thought (B.L.Whorf, 1930’s)

What happen when people of different cultures meet and become involved?

• Communication occurs simultaneously on different levels of consciousness, ranging from

awareness to out-of-awareness.
• All people are sensitive to subtle changes in his demeanor of the other person as he
responds to what we are saying or doing.

Man
• In the most situations will at first unconsciously and later consciously avoid escalation.
• In the international-intercultural sphere of life many difficulties can be traced to failure to
read adumbration correctly.
• In such instances, by the time people discover what is going on, they are so deeply
involved that they can’t back out.

Animals
If the adumbrative process is short-circuited or bypassed vicious fighting is part to occur.

Development of Culture
• Man developed culture
• Domesticated himself in the culture
• Creation of a whole new series of worlds, each different from the other
• Each world has its own set of sensory inputs
• Distinction of culture = aggression
• Racial and Regional Discrimination: stressful to one people but neutral to others.

PERCEPTION OF SPACE : DISTANCE RECEPTORS (EYES, EARS, NOSE)

Man’s Sensory Apparatus:

1. Distance Receptors
For examination of distant objects
 Eyes Visual space
 Eats Auditory space
 Nose Olfactory space

2. Immediate Receptors
For examination of the world in close up
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  Skin Thermal space (both an immediate &
distance receptors)
 Membranes Tactile Space
 Muscle Tactile

VISUAL AND AUDITORY SPACE

Vision
The act or power of seeing; the sense of sight.

Sight : the act or power of seeing with the eye.

Three Steps in the Swift and Sophisticated Processing Which Result in the Images We
See

1. Reception
Receiving of energy input in the form of light.
2. Extraction
Basic visual features and extracted.
3. Inference.
On the basics of these extracted features, inference are made about our world.

AUDITORY SPACE

Auditory
Relating to or based on the sense of hearing.
In normally alert subject, it is probable that the eyes may be as much as a thousand times as
effective as the ears in sweeping up information.
• Visual information tends to be less ambiguous and more focused than auditory
information,
Auditory space as a factor in performance (J.W. Black)
• The size and reverberation time of a room affects reading rates.
• People read more slowly in larger rooms where the reverberation time is slowly than they
do in a smaller room.
• Acoustic design of cathedrals
o Durham cathedral as the perfect model
Effect of culture
• Japanese screen visually in a variety of ways but are perfectly content with paper walls
acoustic screen.
• Germans and Dutch depend on thick walls and double doors to screen sound.

OLFACTORY

Olfactory
Relating to or based on the sense of smell.
• Olfactory obscure memories.
o Smell evokes much deeper
memories than either vision or
sound.
• Odor, one of the earliest and most basic
methods of communication.
o The chemical sense, chemical in nature
• Smell are enhanced in dense media (water),
and do not work as well in thin media (sky).
o Salmons returning to river from sea.
o Hawk finding a mouse thousand feet below.

PERCEPTION OF SPACE : IMMEDIATE RECEPTORS (SKIN AND MUSCLES)

Kinesthesia (Kinesthetic)
The sensory experience of bodily position, presence, or movement derived chiefly from stimulation
of nerve ending in muscles, tendons, and joints.

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INTERRELATION OF KINESTHETIC EXPERIENCE OF SPACE AND VISUAL EXPERIENCE

• Early Japanese Gardens

Stretching of visual space by exaggerating
kinesthetic experience.

• Japanese Interiors
Spatial experience is clear

Thermal Space

Factor Involved in Thermal Space

• The Nervous System
• Emotional States
• Blood Supply
• Temperature

Tactile Space

Haptic
Relating to or based on the sense of touch.
• Touch and visual spatial experience
interwoven and cannot be separated.

VISUAL SPACE

VISUAL PERCEPTION
An awareness derived by the visual system in response to an external stimulus.

VISION AS SYNTHESIS
Man learns while he sees and what he learns influences what he sees.
• Man depends on the messages received from his body to stabilize
o His visual worlds as he moves through space.
 Without such body feedback = hallucination, schizophrema
o Kinesthesia as a corrective to vision.
o A mountain that never looks the same once it has been climbed by the viewer.

THE IMPLICATIONS OF THE STRUCTURE OF THE EYE FOR THE DESIGN OF SPACE
• Movement is exaggerated at the periphery of the eye.

o Straight edges, alternates black and

yellow. Has the highest visual
impact.

o Regularly spaced columns

exaggerate the sense of
movement.

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 o Cars tend to slow down.

o To increase the speed of the

motorist in tunnel, it is necessary to
reduce the number of visual impact
that flash by at eye level.

o In libraries, restaurant, public spaces, cutting down on movement in the

peripheral fields should reduce the sense of crowding.

Stereoscopic Vision
Factor in depth perception at close distance.

• 16 feet or less
• Within a few seconds of looking in to a stereoscope. There is a strong urge to move the
head, to change the view and to see the foreground move while the background stands
still an illusion.
THE SEEING MECHANISM

Binocular Vision

Convergence

Accommodation

Visual Field
Visual Cortex
•

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MAN’S VARIOUS SYSTEM OF DEPTH PERCEPTION AS HE MOVES THROUGH SPACE

SUMMARY OF JAMES GIBSON’S 13 VARIETIES OF PERSPECTIVE (AS ABSTRACTED

FROM THE PERCEPTION OF THE VISUAL WORLD)

“There is no such thing as perception of space without a

continuous background surface.”
__ J. Gibsons

A. Perspectives of Position

1. Texture Perspective
o The gradual increase in the density of the texture of a surface as it recedes in
the distance.

2. Size Perspective
o As the object get farther away they decrease in size

3. Linear Perspective
o The most commonly know form of perspective. A mathematical system for
representing 3-D objects and spatial relationships on a 2-D surface by means of
perspective projection.

B. Perspective of Parallax

4. Binocular Perspective
o Operates very much out of awareness. The separation of the eye projection each
a different image.
o Closing and opening one eye and then the makes the differences in the images
apparent.

5. Motion Perspective
o As one moves forward in space, the closer one approaches a stationary object,
the faster it appears to move.
o Objects moving at uniform speeds appear to be moving more slowly as distance
increases.

C. Perspectives Independent of the Position or Motion of the Observer

6. Aerial Perspective/ Atmospheric Perspective

o Derived from the increased haziness and changes in color due to the intervening
atmosphere.
o It is an indicator of distance but no as stable and reliable as some of the other
forms of perspective.
o In drawing, a technique for rendering depth or distance by muting the hue, tone,
and distinctness of objects perceived as receding from the picture plane.

7. The Perspective of Blur

o Evident when focusing on an object held out in front of the face so that the
background is blurred.
o Object in a visual plane other than the one which the eyes are focused will be
seen less distinctly.

8. Relative Upward Location in the Visual Field

o The Horizon is seen as a line at about eye level.
o The Surface of the globe climbs, as it where, from one’s feet to eye level.
o The further from the ground one is, the more pronounced this effect.
o In the context of everyday experience, one looks down at object that are close
and up to objects that are far away.

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 9. Shift of Texture or Linear Spacing
o A valley seen over the edge of a cliff is perceived as more distant because of the
break or rapid increase in texture density.
o Standing on a grassy edge, looking down 1500 feet at streets and houses of a
village, blades of grass were sharply etched in the visual field, while each blade
was the width of one of the small houses.

10. Shift in the Amount of Double Imagery

o If one looks at a distant point, every between the viewer and the point will be
seen as double.
o The closer to the viewer, the greater the doubling; the more distant the point,
the less doubling.

11. Shift in the Rate Motion

o Differential movement of objects in the visual fields
o One of the most dependable and consistent ways of sensing depth.
o Close object move much more than distant object.

12. Completeness or Continuity of Outline

o Camouflage, deceptive because it breaks the continuity.
o Even if thee is no texture difference, no shift in double imagery, and no shift in
the rate of motion.

13. Transition Between Light and Shade

o An abrupt shift in brightness of an object in the visual field will signal as an edge
(similar to change in texture) gradual transition in brightness.
o Principal means of perceiving molding or roundness

THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF SPACE : AN ORGANIZING MODEL

INFRACULTURE
Behavior on the lower organizational levels that underlie culture. It is a part of the Proxemics
classification system and implies a specific set of levels of relationship with other parts of the
system.

THREE PROXEMICS MANIFESTATIONS

1. Infracultural
Behavior and is rooted in man’s biological past.
2. Precultural
Physiological and very much in the present
3. Microcultural
The one on which most Proxemics observation are made.

FIXED-FEATURE SPACE
• A way of organizing activities of individuals and groups. It includes material manifestation
as well as hidden, internalized design that govern behavior as man moves about.

• Buildings
o One of the expressions of fixed-features space. Buildings are grouped together in
characteristic ways as well as being divided internally according to culturally
determined designs.

• Cities, Towns, Villages’ layout

o Follows a plan which changes with the time and culture.

SEMIFIXED-FEATURE SPACE
• Flexibility and congruence between design and function is desirable so that there is a
variety of spaces, and people can be involved or not, as the occasion and mood demand.

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 • Furniture arrangement in public spaces.
o Has a distinct relationship to the degree of conservation.

Sociofugal Spaces
Tend to discourage conversation.

Sociopetal Spaces
Tend to bring people together.

Relationship of Furniture to Conversation

• Provided 6 different distances and orientation of the bodies in relation to each other.

F-A Across the corner (2x as frequent as the C-B)

C-B Side by side (3x as frequent as at C-D)
C-D Across the table
E-A From one tend to other
E-F Diagonally the length of the table
C-F Diagonally across the table

• No conversations were observed for the other position (after 50 observation session).

Informal Space

• The most important for the individual’s spatial experience because it includes the
distances maintained in encounters with others.

DISTANCES IN MAN

THE DYNAMISM OF SPACE

• Man and animals sense distance.

• His perception of space is dynamic because it is related to action.
o What can be done in a given space-rather than what is seen by passive viewing
• The general failure to grasp the significance of the many elements that contribute to
man’s sense of space may be due to two mistaken.
o That for every effect thee is a single and identifiable cause.
o Man’s boundary begins and ends with his skin.

INTIMATE DISTANCE

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Combination of sight often distorted), olfaction, heat from the other person’s body, sound, smell,
and fell of the other breath signal unmistakable involvement with other body.

Close Phase
• Love-making, wrestling, comforting, projecting.
• Physical contact or the high possibility of physical involvement is uppermost in the
awareness of both persons.

Far Phase
• Distance : 6-18 inches
• Heads, thighs, and pelvis are not easily brought into contact, but hands can reach and
grasp extremities.

PERSONAL DISTANCE (PERSONAL SPACE)

• The space can be thought as a small projective sphere or bubble that an organism
(especially man) maintains between itself and others.
• The variables and subjective distance at which one person feels comfortable talking to
another.

Close Phase
• Distance : 1 ½-2 ½’
• One can hold or grasp the other person,

Far Phase
• Distance : 2 ½-4’ (arm’s length)
• The limit of physical domination in the very real sense

SOCIAL DISTANCE

• The “Limit of Domination’

Personal Distance Social Distance

Far Phase Close Phase

• Intimate visual detail in the face is not perceived nobody touches or expects to touch
another person.
o Unless there is special effort

Close Phase
• Distance : 4’-7’
• People who work together tends to use close social distance

Far Phase
• Distance : 7’-12’
• People move when someone says, “stand away so i can look at you”
• This can be used to insulate or screen people from each other
• People can continue to work in the presence of another person without appearing to be
rude.

PUBLIC DISTANCE

Close Phase
• Distance : 12’-25’
• At 12’, an alert subject can taken evasive or defensive action in threatened

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 o Voice is loud but not full-volume
o The angle of shift vision (1˚) covers the whole face.
o Fine detail of the skin and eyes are no longer visible.

• At 16’, the body begins to lose its roundness and to look flat color of the eyes white of the
eye is visible.
o Head size, perceived as considerably under life-size.
o The 15 Lozenge-shaped area of clear vision covers the faces of two people at
12’
o 60˚ scanning includes the whole body with a little space around it.
o Other present can be seen peripherally.

Far Phase
• Distance : 25’ or more
• At 30’ the distance that is automatically set around important public figures.
• > 30’, actors voice and action must be exaggerated or amplifified this is the distance of
public address and theatrical performance.

MONOCHRONIC & POLYCHRONIC TIME

Handling of time in structuring of space.

1. Monochronic
• Characteristic of low-involvement peoples, who compartmentalize time. A
monochronic person separate activities in space.
• They schedule one thing at a time and become disoriented if they have deal with too
many things at once.

2. Polychronic
• People that are so much involved with each other, tend to keep several operations
going at once, like jugglers.
o Polychronic person tends to collect activities.

Further Creation of Congenial Spaces

Encouraging and strengthening the cultural enclave

• It will assist the city and the enclave in the transformation process that takes place
generation by generation.
• It will strengthen social controls that combat lawlessness.

THE AUTOMOBILE SYNDROME

• The automobile is the greatest consumer of public and personal space yet created by
man.
o i.e. Los Angeles, 60-70 % of the space devoted to cars (B.Ward).
o People do not wish to walk anymore.
o For those who wish to walk, it is hard to find a place to walk.

• The heart of our cities, by the architect Victor Gruen.

o There is no inherent incompatibility between man in an urban setting and the
automobile.
 Proper planning
 Built-in design features which separates cars from people.

• The automobile not only seals its occupant in a metal and glass cocoon, cutting them off
from the outside world.
o Decreasing the sense of movement through space.
 Man’s entire organism was designed to move through the environment
at < five miles per hour.

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A speed increases, sensory involvement
o Falls off until one is experiencing
real sensory deprivation.

Contained Community

• In the heart of the city one needs more

spaces in the home, not less.
• The home must be an antidote for city
stresses

Marina City, Chicago, Bertrand Goldberg

Goldberg designed circular apartments: towers with lower floor that spiral upward and provide
open-air, off street parking facilities for the residents.
• Marketing and entertainment facilities
• The tower offer projection from weather and traffic disturbances

PROSPECTUS FOR CITY PLANNING OF THE FUTURE

The city is an expression of the culture of the people who produced it.
• Finding suitable methods for computing and measuring human scale in all its dimensions
including the hidden dimensions of culture.
o Proper meshing of human scale and scale imposed by the automobiles

• Making constructive use of the ethnic enclave.

o Man’s image of himself is closely related to the space he inhabits
o Various cultures and other ethnic groups should be rendered with more efforts to
discover and satisfy their needs.
o Reinforce the positive elements of their cultures that help to provide identity and
strength.

• Conserving large, readily available outdoor spaces

o Setting aside large section of primitive outdoors in addition to city recreation
areas and green belts.

• Preserving useful, satisfying old buildings and neighborhoods from “the bomb” of urban
renewal.

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