DESIGNING FOR HUMAN BEHAVIOURS

Have you ever find yourself in a situation that you do not feel like staying so long in your living room, sleeping in your bedroom, or you do not feel like cooking in your kitchen or reading in your study room during the day? If you've experienced something like that before, most time, you ask yourself; what is  wrong?

It is possible nothing is wrong with but spaces created for you in the building is not meant for you, they are probably not in harmony with your psyche because building spaces where people live have direct or indirect impact on behaviors. For example, in the above scenario it is possible that you feel unease or lazy to cook in your kitchen due to small kitchen space, arrangement in the kitchen or poor lightening or other reasons relating to design problem in the building. Inability to read in your study room may be due to poor ventilation especially natural ventilation in the space, it can be due to excess sun glare during the day or some defects in building design. It is possible to be affected positively or negatively in building spaces due to complex relationship between built environment and human behaviors.

When an architect create a building design, he has begun a process that will have an impact on lives of humans he is designing for. There are ways in which the drawing concepts created by Architects affect users of buildings because every time an architect or an urban designer creates a wall or pave a street, he intervenes in the behavioral modes of the population of such space. The consequences of his intervention may be major or minor, benign or malignant but they are always real. (James Marston Fitch)

The way built environment is created and put in order have effects on behaviors of humans, nature of space created by an architect can affect how it is used by occupants because complex relationship exist between built environment and human behaviors. It is advisable for architects to create spaces that will enhance positive effect on occupants. For example, a building design created with ambiguity and complexity for a person who love working in flexible and accessible spaces may have negative effects on the person behaviors at work consciously or unconsciously.

 To make a building design perform its function, it is paramount that an architect should endeavor to create spaces and put their elements together in a way that there will be a positive effect on behaviors of space users by designing spaces considering so many things which include the following points;

(1)   Understanding Clients and Users: two clients or two users can not be treated the same way, to have a design that effectively suit your client or building user, you must be able to understand their psychology, culture, needs, wants, major and minor climate and costs for construction and maintenance. Failure to understand them may result into creating spaces that are not really meant for building users but if you understand them, what you will always hear from your clients will be “the building is perfectly made for me”

(2)   Know that you are not designing for yourself: Do not be an architect who enforces his design on his client or do as I say architect, the proper blend of the two types is better because you can influence your client decision positively with your professional inputs.  Knowing that you are not the user of a building design will make you create spaces that are meant for the users. In selecting things like form, it may be done based on space suitability for the users and not to impress building observers because a successful design is the one that make its user happy and not the one that is appealing to the observers alone. Do not be too sure that no matter the kind of form you create or design concept used, the user will adequately adjust and adapt to the spaces.

(3)   Designing not for eyes alone: Do not design for the eyes alone but also for the ears, body, soul and spirit. Most Architects nowadays tend to design for the eyes alone and thus end up creating structures that are pleasing, beautiful, and gracious to the eyes but are not functional or livable in terms of form, site concept, space relationship, acoustic properties, ventilation, lighting, comfort levels and E.t.c. For Example, a beautiful house with very low acoustic properties for spaces may end up making an occupant sick if there are noisy neighbors and you hate noise. Living in a house with high level of noise above bearable decibels can affect behaviors negatively, it may be difficult to concentrate on activities in such house when people discussion around you that do not concern you are always running through your head without eavedropping. In some buildings, you can hardly sit comfortably in the living room due to excess light reflection and sun glare while in some beautiful structures, someone can hardly breath properly due to poor and inefficient ventilation especially natural ventilation. In lieu of these things, it is advisable that the architect should design not just for aesthetics alone but also for functionality.

There are more points to consider when designing to influence positive human behaviors, in other part of this post, I will explain them. Meanwhile, feel free to add other points you think can be added. Try to become a member of this blog to have more benefits. Thank you.

Email this Post to a Friend

Categories: ARCHITECTURE, Designing for Human Behaviour.