"This volume attempts to make the case that our understanding of psychological phenomena can be greatly informed by a geographical perspective--one that explores the spatial organization of psychological phenomena and considers how individual characteristics, social entities, and physical features of the environment contribute to their organization. The chapters in the book highlight the ways in which social and physical features of the environment, such as local demography, political and economic institutions, topography, and climate, influence and interact with psychological processes. The perspectives described herein complement and extend theory and research in several areas of psychology, including social, personality, cultural, environmental, evolutionary, and comparative. By bringing together streams of research at the intersection of geographical psychology, I have tried to show how widely studied psychological constructs relate to and are influenced by broad social, ecological, economic, and political forces. At the same time, this research demonstrates the relevance of psychology for understanding macro-level processes. Ultimately, this book is designed to inform researchers about the value of examining psychological phenomena and their spatial components"--Introduction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).

Active researchers in the areas of geography and psychology have contributed to this book. Both fields are capable of increasing our scientific knowledge of how human behavior is interfaced with the molar physical environment. Such knowledge is essential for the solution of many of today's most urgent environmental problems. Failure to constrain use of scarce resources, pollution due to human activities, creation of technological hazards and deteriorating urban quality due to vandalism and crime are all well known examples. The influence of psychology in geographical research has long been appreciated but it is only recently that psychologists have recognized they have something to learn from geography. In identifying the importance of two-way interdisciplinary communication, a psychologist and a geographer have been invited to each write a chapter in this book on a designated topic so that close comparisons can be drawn as to how the two disciplines approach the same difficulties. Since the disciplines are to some extent complementary, it is hoped that this close collaboration will have synergistic effects on the attempts of both to find solutions to environmental problems through an increased understanding of the many behavior-environment interfaces.

Psychological characteristics are significant for various stages of the entrepreneurial process on both individual and group levels. Looking into the ‘psychological context’ in entrepreneurship, Martin Obschonka reviews and defines the field, exploring the role of regional and country-level entrepreneurial personality and new trends in the geography of entrepreneurial psychology influenced by technological advances.

Mobility of mankind has increased enormously in the past few decades. People leave their homes and native countries for business and study, for vacation or to flee from unsafe conditions like wars and natural disasters. In all cases the sojourner faces a dual challenge of breaking with the familiar home environment and adjusting to new surroundings. This book deals with the psychological and health consequences of leaving the familiar home and the process of creating a new one. The focus is mainly on acculturation stress and homesickness, which both are relevant to those who travel. Acculturation refers to the process and outcome of a person’s encounter with, and adaptation to, a culturally new and different environment. Homesickness is defined as a depression-like reaction to leaving one’s home. The contributions in this book present empirical data as well as theoretical and conceptual discussions. Causes, consequences, moderating variables, and theoretical explanations are discussed. Both short-term (e.g., vacations) and long-term (e.g. immigration) separations from home receive attention. By combining these different but related topics, this book provides a valuable overview for researchers, teachers, students and professionals working with people who present with problems related to migration or traveling.

In this engaging and spirited book, eminent social psychologist Robert Levine asks us to explore a dimension of our experience that we take for granted—our perception of time. When we travel to a different country, or even a different city in the United States, we assume that a certain amount of cultural adjustment will be required, whether it's getting used to new food or negotiating a foreign language, adapting to a different standard of living or another currency. In fact, what contributes most to our sense of disorientation is having to adapt to another culture's sense of time.Levine, who has devoted his career to studying time and the pace of life, takes us on an enchanting tour of time through the ages and around the world. As he recounts his unique experiences with humor and deep insight, we travel with him to Brazil, where to be three hours late is perfectly acceptable, and to Japan, where he finds a sense of the long-term that is unheard of in the West. We visit communities in the United States and find that population size affects the pace of life—and even the pace of walking. We travel back in time to ancient Greece to examine early clocks and sundials, then move forward through the centuries to the beginnings of ”clock time” during the Industrial Revolution. We learn that there are places in the world today where people still live according to ”nature time,” the rhythm of the sun and the seasons, and ”event time,” the structuring of time around happenings(when you want to make a late appointment in Burundi, you say, ”I'll see you when the cows come in”).Levine raises some fascinating questions. How do we use our time? Are we being ruled by the clock? What is this doing to our cities? To our relationships? To our own bodies and psyches? Are there decisions we have made without conscious choice? Alternative tempos we might prefer? Perhaps, Levine argues, our goal should be to try to live in a ”multitemporal” society, one in which we learn to move back and forth among nature time, event time, and clock time. In other words, each of us must chart our own geography of time. If we can do that, we will have achieved temporal prosperity.

This ism-busting text is an enormously accessible account of the key philosophical and theoretical ideas that have informed geographical research. It makes abstract ideas explicit and clearly connects it with real practices of geographical research and knowledge. Written with flair and passion, A Student′s Introduction to Geographical Thought: Explains the key ideas: scientific realism, anti-realism and idealism / positivism / critical rationalism / Marxism and critical realism/ social constructionism and feminism / phenomenology and post-phenomenology / postmodernism and post-structuralism / complexity / moral philosophy. Uses examples that address both physical geography and human geography. Use a familiar and real-world example - ‘the beach’ - as an entry point to basic questions of philosophy, returning to this to illustrate and to explain the links between philosophy, theory, and methodology. All chapters end with summaries and sources of further reading, a glossary explaining key terms, exercises with commentaries, and web resources of key articles from the journals Progress in Human Geography and Progress in Physical Geography. A Student′s Introduction to Geographical Thought is a completely accessible student A-Z of theory and practice for both human and physical geography.

This textbook provides a clear and comprehensive introduction to the rapidly expanding field of environmental psychology. The authors start with a review of the history of environmental psychology, highlighting its interdisciplinary nature. They trace its roots in architecture, ecology and geography, and examine the continuing relationship of these subjects to the psychological tradition. The book then moves through key contemporary lines of research in the field, contrasting models from perception and cognition, such as those of Gibson and Brunswick, with major social psychological approaches as represented by Lewin, Barker and others. The book concludes with an analysis of the most promising areas of research and practice