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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of

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Speaker 1: I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, you, welcome to

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Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb

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Speaker 1: and I'm Joe McCormick and Robert I thought we should

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Speaker 1: start off today talking about a place where Romans get naked.

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Speaker 1: Let's do it or gott naked. Would not be the

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Speaker 1: first time. Oh, I guess that's probably true. Where when

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Speaker 1: else have we done this? Well? Well, um, well, of

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Speaker 1: course we have another show called Invention, and we've definitely

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Speaker 1: touched on the history of toilets and baths, and I

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Speaker 1: think Roman baths have come up on the show before,

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Speaker 1: and just Roman culture in general. Roman culture, like any culture,

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Speaker 1: is going to contain a certain amount of nudity, if

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Speaker 1: not maybe a slightly enhanced amount of nudity. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: human life, it's culture, it's bare bottoms. So the baths

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Speaker 1: of Caracalla, they are these beautiful ruins in the city

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Speaker 1: of Rome. They were built sometime in the early third century,

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Speaker 1: beginning under the emperor Septimus Severus, and they were finished

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Speaker 1: during the reign of his son, the Emperor Caracalla. Now

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Speaker 1: these were public baths that operated for hundreds of years.

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Speaker 1: I think they were in operation until sometime in the

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Speaker 1: sixth century. And the interior space of these baths, it

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Speaker 1: doesn't remain inclosed now the ruins are you know, you

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Speaker 1: can see some like you can see columns, and there's

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Speaker 1: actually a lot of vertical structure still there. But you know,

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Speaker 1: they don't have the roofs anymore and that kind of thing.

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Speaker 1: But the interior space and these baths originally when they

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Speaker 1: were in operation, was palatial, with these huge vaulted cathedral

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Speaker 1: like ceilings and huge open halls, and apparently they inspired

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Speaker 1: the design of the original Pin station in New York.

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Speaker 1: But there was a quote I wanted to read that

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Speaker 1: comes from the American architect Louis Kahn. Louis Kahn was

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Speaker 1: at one point a professor of architecture at Yale, but

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Speaker 1: he was also known for tons of iconic original designs,

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Speaker 1: such as the campus of the Salk Institute for Biological

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Speaker 1: Studies in San Diego. Robert, I don't know you've ever

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Speaker 1: seen that one, but it's one of the strangest looking

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Speaker 1: college campuses I've ever seen, and it's kind of beautiful

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Speaker 1: in a weird way. It's got these buildings that look

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Speaker 1: kind of like glass and concrete accordions, you know, with

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Speaker 1: these strange kind of angles coming in. But anyway, Louis Kahn,

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Speaker 1: talking about the baths of Caracalla, he says, if you

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Speaker 1: look at the baths of Caracala, we all know that

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Speaker 1: we can bathe just as well under an eight foot

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Speaker 1: ceiling as we can under a one hundred and fifty

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Speaker 1: foot ceiling. But there's something about a one hundred fifty

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Speaker 1: foot ceiling that makes a man a different kind of man.

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Speaker 1: And I wonder about this, like, well, first of all,

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Speaker 1: I just wonder, would you literally wash yourself differently under

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Speaker 1: an hundred and fifty foot ceiling if you're like taking

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Speaker 1: if you're taking a bath in a cathedral, does that

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Speaker 1: affect the bath at all? Well, I I have to

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Speaker 1: say I can't. I don't really have a good basis

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Speaker 1: of comparison here, because I think I've bathed pretty much

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Speaker 1: exclusively in like non amphitheater environments. But on the other hand,

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Speaker 1: I said, only I can certainly think about swimming pools,

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Speaker 1: and generally when I in a swimming pool, it's either

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Speaker 1: open air or it does have a very high ceiling,

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Speaker 1: which is certainly part of the experience. Then the idea

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Speaker 1: of swimming and one of these sort of like old

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Speaker 1: timey basement pools or like one of those sometimes you

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Speaker 1: see like an image of a of a small swimming

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Speaker 1: environment on a submarine or something. Have you ever seen

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Speaker 1: the swimming pool in the basement of the Builtmore house? Yes, okay,

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Speaker 1: this is creepy looking. Yeah, I can't imagine us from there. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's so enclosed. It feels like you're going into an

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Speaker 1: underwater cave where you'll be hunted by glowing jellyfish until

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Speaker 1: you die. Yeah. Besides, that's that's Mason Berger's swimming pool.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to I don't want to swim there.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean so, we we've talked before about

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Speaker 1: some of the possible psychological effects of you know, bathroom

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Speaker 1: related architectural features. I remember when we did the episode

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Speaker 1: of our other show Invention, about the invention of the toilet.

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Speaker 1: I remember thinking, like, does the location and shape design

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Speaker 1: of the place where you go to defecate shape your

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Speaker 1: feelings about these body functions? Like do people who go

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Speaker 1: to the bathroom with a flush toilet inside their house

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Speaker 1: tend to have different attitudes? On average? Towards a scatological

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Speaker 1: humor or things like that than people who would use

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Speaker 1: say a wooden outhouse or an open pit latrine, or

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Speaker 1: any other way of going to the bathroom. Well, certainly,

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Speaker 1: urinating outside and under the right circumstances, obviously, um like

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Speaker 1: in the woods, is a totally different experience than than

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Speaker 1: urinating inside of a restroom or into a urinal um.

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Speaker 1: And I would say it is. It is overall a

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Speaker 1: better experience. I've never really stopped to really consider why,

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Speaker 1: but it does feel better to urinate in nature, again,

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Speaker 1: assuming that it is the ideal sort of nature, not say,

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Speaker 1: you know, uh, at a bus stop or um or

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Speaker 1: or even in the woods on like at a dark,

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Speaker 1: rainy evening, that sort of thing. Yeah, I get what

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Speaker 1: you're saying. I mean, I don't want to draw to

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Speaker 1: direct an analogy, because I'm sure extremely different things are

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Speaker 1: going on, But I mean, you watch the way that

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Speaker 1: dogs urinate in their environment, and that's like a that's

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Speaker 1: like a you know, a territory marking and information can

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Speaker 1: conveying thing, at least in some cases for dogs. I'm

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Speaker 1: not saying humans do the same thing, but you've gotta

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Speaker 1: wonder maybe I don't know if there's some kind of

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Speaker 1: like instinctual preference for some types of expansive urination behavior

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Speaker 1: as opposed to enclosed urination behavior. I don't know well,

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Speaker 1: or certainly the power to urinate where you do not

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Speaker 1: live or where you are not currently residing, like that

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Speaker 1: is ultimately more natural than urinating within a shelter and

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Speaker 1: that you live in, uh in in terms of the

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Speaker 1: grand history of humanity. And so already we're we're we're

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Speaker 1: getting we're dealing with this, with this duality, this dichotomy

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Speaker 1: rather of of life indoors, life in created environments, and

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Speaker 1: of course life in nature, in the natural world. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And that's what we're gonna keep coming back to this

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Speaker 1: as we discuss for two episodes of stuff to blow

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Speaker 1: your mind. Uh, the psychological power of architecture. Yeah, uh yeah,

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Speaker 1: So I want to come back to Lewis Kahn's question,

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Speaker 1: like the idea of whether bathing in a cathedral like

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Speaker 1: building with a huge high ceiling has it sort of

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Speaker 1: creates a different kind of person or creates a different

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Speaker 1: kind of mindset than bathing in a normal bathroom like

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Speaker 1: most people would today. Yeah. Yeah, And and of course

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Speaker 1: we can take this and apply it to just about

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Speaker 1: every aspect of life, right of course. I mean we're

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Speaker 1: we're not just talking about bathing. It's it's about our lives.

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Speaker 1: And you know, in the year twenty nineteen, probably most

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Speaker 1: of the people listening to this podcast are gonna going

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Speaker 1: to be spending the majority of their lives in and

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Speaker 1: around artificial environments created by humans rather than living you know,

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Speaker 1: in the natural environment. This can't be psychologically and culturally irrelevant, right, So, so, yeah,

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Speaker 1: we want to talk about the hidden psychological and cultural

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Speaker 1: impacts of the buildings that we live in and around.

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Speaker 1: I think we've before considered the ways that culture and

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Speaker 1: human psychology shape architecture, right, you know, like like human

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Speaker 1: drives towards building certain kinds of buildings, But how does

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Speaker 1: it work the other way around? How does architecture affect

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Speaker 1: our minds and our societies? Yeah, you know, there's a

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Speaker 1: there's a there's a famous quote by Winston Churchill from

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Speaker 1: a speech that he was giving, uh, you know, regarding

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Speaker 1: you know, reconstruction, and he said, quote, we shape our buildings,

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Speaker 1: and afterwards our buildings shape us. Yeah. Of course, this

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Speaker 1: is a lot of what we end up discussing on invention, right,

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Speaker 1: and not just like why we why humans created a

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Speaker 1: certain invention, but how that invention turned around and shaped society. Absolutely,

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Speaker 1: at the very least, it's something you have to look

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Speaker 1: at all the time. But also these new objects, new technologies,

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Speaker 1: they give us new ways to think about ourselves. So

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Speaker 1: first of all, let's talk about that which architecture imitates

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Speaker 1: and indeed what all of our human designed and human

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Speaker 1: created buildings and structures and architectural objects are made out of.

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Speaker 1: And that is of course a natural world. So to

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Speaker 1: state the obvious natural environments have an effect on us,

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Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, that's putting it mild, Like the natural

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Speaker 1: environments created us. That's right. The whole process of evolution

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Speaker 1: is being shaped by the environment. Yeah, we are made

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Speaker 1: out of it as well. Uh, the environment sustains us. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And say, just if we can just think back to

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Speaker 1: if you took a hike recently, um, which I was

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Speaker 1: fortunate enough to to to do recently, to take a

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Speaker 1: hike through the wilderness. Um, just think about what that

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Speaker 1: experience was was like all the ways that it sustained you.

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Speaker 1: That the air didn't just feel nice, it allows you

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Speaker 1: to breathe the sudden sun didn't just feel warm on

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Speaker 1: your skin, it provided you with vitamin D. You expose

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Speaker 1: yourself to a host of microbes that influence your inner

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Speaker 1: dimensions and and and contributed to your your microbial health. Now,

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Speaker 1: your distant ancestors might have well engaged on a similar

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Speaker 1: walk through the woods or through the wilderness whatever is

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Speaker 1: coming into your mind here, and they would have been breathing,

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Speaker 1: they would have been absorbing sunlight, and they would have

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Speaker 1: been encountering microbes as well. But they would have also

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Speaker 1: looked with a keen eye for the various elements that

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Speaker 1: would have truly sustained them. Flora that might be gathered,

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Speaker 1: rocks and stones that might be used in tool construction,

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Speaker 1: and fauna or the signs of fauna that could be

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Speaker 1: killed for meat uh and or organic construction elements, things

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Speaker 1: that could be utilized again in their their toolmaking and

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Speaker 1: their shelter and their clothing. And they might have had

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Speaker 1: a keen eye as well for environmental conditions that were

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Speaker 1: advantageous or detrimental to their survival. Fresh water caves, natural

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Speaker 1: springs in which to bathe, um, hollows that might afford protection,

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Speaker 1: heights of hill or tree that might provide a strategic

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Speaker 1: vantage point, places to hide, places where the enemy might dwell,

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Speaker 1: and places of potential mundane and sacred importance as well.

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Speaker 1: And it's argued that a lot of these observations are

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Speaker 1: still active and as submerged as we embark on such

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Speaker 1: a walk or a hike through the woods, or spend

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Speaker 1: any amount of time in a natural domain, or even

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Speaker 1: just a place that is cultivated to have those properties,

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Speaker 1: like a you know, a finely manicured city park, that

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Speaker 1: sort of thing. Uh. Such environments fully capture our array

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Speaker 1: of senses, senses that of course evolved to aid us

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Speaker 1: in nature. Nature and returns to nature therefore have long

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Speaker 1: been thought of as having healing powers over us, both

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Speaker 1: mentally and physically. Yeah, and this recalls part of what

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Speaker 1: we talked about when we did an episode on E. O.

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Speaker 1: Wilson's concept of biophilia, which is a hypothetical innate tendency

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Speaker 1: in humans to focus on life and lifelike processes instead

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Speaker 1: of on you know, the unnatural synthetic types of objects. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And citing the hypothesis here, by the way, it's not

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Speaker 1: an indication that we assume it to be coherent or correct.

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Speaker 1: If you want the fuller take. We did an episode

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Speaker 1: on it that also covered criticisms of the idea. But

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Speaker 1: if you recall, one major avenue of evidence that Wilson

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Speaker 1: and others called upon to support it was about the

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Speaker 1: shape of ideal landscapes. You know, there was basically this

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Speaker 1: concept of the environment of evolutionary adaptedness that animals tend

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Speaker 1: not to be adapted to live anywhere on Earth, but

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Speaker 1: to a particular landscape that shaped their genes, and they

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Speaker 1: would have had preferences within that landscape of you know,

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Speaker 1: things they like to be around that make it easier

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Speaker 1: to survive, and as such, like their brains should have

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Speaker 1: a ways of telling them to look for that type

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Speaker 1: of landscape, look for the place that you're most adapted to. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And so it turns out that there are certain things

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Speaker 1: that lots of humans seem to show preferences for with

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Speaker 1: when they when they're presented with different options of landscapes.

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Speaker 1: People tend to like open spaces with low grasses interspersed

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Speaker 1: with copses of trees. Uh. They like the trees to

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Speaker 1: look like trees that could maybe be climbed. They like

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Speaker 1: to be able to see water nearby. They like to

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Speaker 1: be able to see uh, animal or bird life and greenery.

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Speaker 1: They like to be able to see pathways extending into

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Speaker 1: the distance. Uh. And apparently, at least according to the hypothesis,

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Speaker 1: like this landscape type is widely regarded as beautiful, even

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Speaker 1: by people who might now live in places that don't

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Speaker 1: have this kind of landscape. You know, you might live

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Speaker 1: in the Arctic tundra, or in the in the desert

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Speaker 1: or something where you don't see landscapes like this, and

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Speaker 1: yet still people living in these other places often love

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Speaker 1: to see that kind of imagery, right, And it's often

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Speaker 1: brought up that this is why many of the more

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Speaker 1: famous and beloved landscape paintings or paintings that aren't even

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Speaker 1: specifically landscape have a landscape element to them, you know,

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Speaker 1: such as um, well you might take um was it

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Speaker 1: is it Brugal the Elders um? Uh? Fall of Icarus?

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Speaker 1: I think so? Yeah, where you know, the the subject

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Speaker 1: is Icarus falling from the heavens on his failed wings.

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Speaker 1: But it is, but it's a it is a piece

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Speaker 1: of art that is predominantly concerned with landscape. Yes, and

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Speaker 1: now these kind of preferences, of course, this could be

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Speaker 1: interpreting them wrong. You know, maybe there are other reasons

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Speaker 1: people like things like this. Maybe people don't even widely

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Speaker 1: like them as much as it's alleged that they do.

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Speaker 1: But if this is correct, it seems like not hard

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Speaker 1: to imagine why we have a keen eye for that

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Speaker 1: sort of stuff. Access to water is important for life,

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Speaker 1: Access to you know, greenery and animals are important to

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Speaker 1: you know, for food and for shade and for all

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Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Uh, it's nice to be able

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Speaker 1: to see from a high vantage point, as you mentioned earlier.

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Speaker 1: That's like a safety security kind of thing. Yeah. Or

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Speaker 1: if if some sort of animal were to chase you,

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Speaker 1: it's nice to think that you might be able to

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Speaker 1: seek refuge in you know, in the limbs of a

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Speaker 1: tree or at the top of a jungle gym, that

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Speaker 1: sort of thing, yes, a climbable tree. Yeah. So, whether

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Speaker 1: or not there's there's truth to this whole connection between

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Speaker 1: biophilia and the supposed landscape of evolutionary adapted nous, there

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Speaker 1: is certainly the fact that we are brains were shaped

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Speaker 1: by our ancestral environments, and it should not be surprising

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Speaker 1: to us that we have preferences for certain types of

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Speaker 1: visually identifiable features of environments as a posed to others. Absolutely. Now,

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Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier that there's this idea that spending time

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Speaker 1: in nature has a beneficial effect on us mentally and physically.

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Speaker 1: And this is a this is a very old idea

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Speaker 1: that you'll you'll find this, uh in a number of

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Speaker 1: different cultures. Uh. One one great example is forest therapy

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Speaker 1: in Japan. According to Rebecca A. Lawton, writing for Ian

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Speaker 1: Magazine in an article titled the Healing Power of Nature,

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Speaker 1: she points out that you know this, this age old

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Speaker 1: tradition calls for the individual to walk, sit, gaze, and

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Speaker 1: exercise amid the trees, as well as to eat local

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Speaker 1: foods and use local hot springs and uh and actually

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Speaker 1: it is a tradition that apparently factors into different studies

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Speaker 1: because it's um, it's it's just apparently like a really

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Speaker 1: good example of Okay, let's see what happens when people

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Speaker 1: who are suffering from one ailment or another take to

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Speaker 1: the woods for a certain amount of time. But anyway,

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Speaker 1: she points out that studies indicate there about only one

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Speaker 1: possible pathways to improved health via exposure to nature. Exposure

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Speaker 1: impacts depression and anxiety and anxiety as well. Plus studies

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Speaker 1: show that just three days and two nights in a

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Speaker 1: woodland environment can increase immune system functions and boost well

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Speaker 1: being for up to seven days. Uh So the notion

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Speaker 1: that we feel better in nature is firmly supported by science,

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Speaker 1: she writes. Uh. Yeah, And this is something that's been

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Speaker 1: argued by a lot of people over the years. That

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Speaker 1: there was a study that I know we've looked at.

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Speaker 1: At least one previous episode might have been the biophilia

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Speaker 1: episode um that was by Ulric published in the journal

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Speaker 1: Science in nineteen eighty four called view through a Window

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Speaker 1: may Influence Recovery from surgery. And basically what this found

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Speaker 1: is that patients in hospitals who could see trees like

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Speaker 1: greenery through a window had better recovery times, like they

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Speaker 1: got out of the hospital earlier, and they used fewer

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Speaker 1: pain medications than people who could not see such things,

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Speaker 1: who were instead faced with the view of a brick wall. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And other studies have also pointed to just having like

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Speaker 1: a landscape painting around to be exposed to can have

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Speaker 1: some degree of effect as well. Now, I think it'd

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Speaker 1: be important to point out that I assumed that the

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Speaker 1: view of nature thing probably has stronger effects on certain

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Speaker 1: types of things than others. Right, I would imagine that

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Speaker 1: it probably especially has effects on treatment outcomes that are

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Speaker 1: subjectively limited, like the perception of pain, and that there

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Speaker 1: you can see also in people taking less pain medication

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Speaker 1: for whatever they were suffering from when they could see nature.

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Speaker 1: The idea there, I guess would be that the view

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Speaker 1: of nature somehow changes your mind state that makes pain

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Speaker 1: less painful. Right and uh, and of course, and we'll

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Speaker 1: get into this more in the second episode. But just

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Speaker 1: because you have a room of the view of nature,

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Speaker 1: that I mean, that does not solve all your problems obviously,

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Speaker 1: right of course. Now, another paper I was looking at,

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Speaker 1: a two thousand seven overview from Villar day at All

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Speaker 1: published in Urban Forestry and Urban Greening, points out that

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Speaker 1: exposure to landscapes in particular, have been shown to reduce stress,

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Speaker 1: improve attention capacity, facilitate recovery from illness, um help with

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Speaker 1: physical well being and the elderly and influenced behavioral changes,

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Speaker 1: and improve mood and general well being. So all this

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Speaker 1: suffice to say, and this is going to sound again

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Speaker 1: like one of those sort of hippie hippie overstatements of

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Speaker 1: the obvious. Here, but nature is simply where we are

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Speaker 1: meant to be, which again it's just crazy to even

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Speaker 1: point that out because it raises the question where else

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Speaker 1: could we be? But in nature? Well, here we are. Ye.

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Speaker 1: Humans steadily created an answer to that question shelters, which

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Speaker 1: of course we have to think about shelters too, Like

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Speaker 1: what dides shelter? Originally? Do? It provided us this place

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Speaker 1: to go when it was better not to be in nature. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's safety, it's protection from the elements, and it's protection

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Speaker 1: from predators and enemies. It's something that uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: protects you from the weather, of course, but then also

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Speaker 1: it's something you can put your back to and there

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Speaker 1: and have a more defensible or securable position from threats. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: In a way, it was like a kind of way

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Speaker 1: of hacking the environment. Like there's a certain type of

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Speaker 1: environmental condition that is ideal for me during say a

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Speaker 1: rain storm, but I cannot find that everywhere when I

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Speaker 1: need it. But what have I? By use of my

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Speaker 1: my my limbs and my strength and my tools and

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Speaker 1: my ingenuity, I'm able to craft the natural world into

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Speaker 1: the shape I need when I need it. I can

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Speaker 1: make a cave. I don't need to find a cave,

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Speaker 1: so it begins there. But of course that evolves and

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Speaker 1: it rises to the level of camps and villages, and

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Speaker 1: the steadily evolves and to the cities of today and

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Speaker 1: today is proposed geological age. The anthropsyn is defined by

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Speaker 1: the transformation of the natural world, which includes the transformation

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Speaker 1: brought by cities and city escapes and the urban sprawl

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Speaker 1: all around them, along with massive environmental alterations that include deforestation, extinctions,

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Speaker 1: mass extinctions, and of course climate change right now. Of course,

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Speaker 1: we're not the only animals that engineer our own environments

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Speaker 1: like beavers. Of course, our our favorite rusty tooth buddies.

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Speaker 1: They are you know, famous for engineering their own environments.

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Speaker 1: Beaver dam is built out of you know, wooden debris

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Speaker 1: and stuff from the surrounding environment. Can become enormous like

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Speaker 1: landscape transforming projects. There's one example of in a wilderness

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Speaker 1: region of northern Alberta, Canada, there is a beaver dam

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Speaker 1: that appears to be over eight hundred and fifty meters

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Speaker 1: long and it's about half a mile. That's almost like

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Speaker 1: a beaver city. Yes, it's like a beaver City. It

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Speaker 1: is so massive that it can actually be seen from

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Speaker 1: satellite photos. In fact, for a while, the aerial photos

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Speaker 1: taken of it, we're the only way that it had

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Speaker 1: been seen by humans that we know of, since it's

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Speaker 1: not like right by a road or a city. It's

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Speaker 1: in this very inaccessible part of the Canadian wilderness that's

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Speaker 1: like hard to get through. You know, there's there's no

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Speaker 1: road that goes there. But in an amateur explorer from

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Speaker 1: New Jersey named Rob Mark plotted a route and actually

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Speaker 1: made the arduous hike through the Mosquito Ou filled marshes

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Speaker 1: and forests to get there and see it in person.

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Speaker 1: And he did. He got there in apparently the beavers

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Speaker 1: have been working on this dam since the nineteen seventies

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Speaker 1: or so. Yeah, and it's huge. It's like the size

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Speaker 1: of a small town. Maybe maybe shouldn't say city, I

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Speaker 1: mean for beavers proportionally, maybe it's a city, but yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is like a settlement size. But um uh, Beaver

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Speaker 1: dams otherwise are fascinating environmental engineering projects. So one interesting

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Speaker 1: purpose they serve I was just reading about I've never

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Speaker 1: read about before, was, uh, when a beaver dams the

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Speaker 1: waterway the reservoir that fills up behind the dam naturally

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Speaker 1: grows deeper than the original waterway, and this deepening helps

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Speaker 1: ensure that when the winter freeze comes, the water is

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Speaker 1: less likely to freeze all the way through, and this

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Speaker 1: cold but unfrozen water at the bottom of the artificial

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Speaker 1: lake serves as a useful place for the beavers to

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Speaker 1: store and access food throughout the winter. That's interesting, I know,

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Speaker 1: I either. So Anyway, all that just emphasized that humans

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Speaker 1: aren't the only animals that alter their environments, that that

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Speaker 1: engineer environments in which to live and change the surrounding landscape.

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Speaker 1: But I think you'd be very safe in assuming that

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Speaker 1: humans alter the natural environment to a much greater extent,

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Speaker 1: and in a greater variety of ways, both deliberate and accidental,

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Speaker 1: than any other animal, and in a shorter amount of time. Yes,

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Speaker 1: Because so we've explored in the show before. You know,

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Speaker 1: vast geological changes that have been brought about via the

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Speaker 1: emergence of life, But we're talking about changes that can

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Speaker 1: be brought on in thousands, hundreds of years, or even

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Speaker 1: decades of course. Uh. And so, of course, one of

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Speaker 1: the perhaps most self defeating ways that we engineer. The

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Speaker 1: natural environment is in creating these living and working spaces

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Speaker 1: for ourselves, almost entirely out of artificial elements and structures.

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Speaker 1: And so you are an animal, but the chances are

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Speaker 1: good that you live in work mostly inside some kind

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Speaker 1: of box with a lot of flat, hard prifaces and

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Speaker 1: ninety degree angles. And how do you like it? Well?

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Speaker 1: It has its ups and doubts, doesn't it. Yeah, well, no,

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Speaker 1: I mean I don't want to undersell the use of

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's good to have a place that you

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Speaker 1: can secure and be safe, and it's good to have

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Speaker 1: a place where you're protected from the elements. That's all

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Speaker 1: good stuff. Oh yeah, absolutely, it is nice to be

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Speaker 1: able to have a temperature controlled box, especially if you

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Speaker 1: were in a part of the world or in a

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Speaker 1: it's a time of the year in which the outside

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Speaker 1: the conditions are not ideal, especially for say, sitting around

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Speaker 1: in front of a computer otherwise motionless. But I wonder

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Speaker 1: if there are ways that the boxes could be better.

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Speaker 1: Oh well, the box can always be better, right, because

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Speaker 1: the ideal box resides in the what the realm of forums? Right? Uh? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So we've we have both the natural environment now and

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Speaker 1: the built environment, the later of which is the design

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Speaker 1: domain of architecture. Architecture comes to us the word comes

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Speaker 1: from the Greek architect on, which means chief creator. We

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Speaker 1: remake the world, but of course we experience the world

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Speaker 1: through our evolved sensibilities for the natural and hopefully, Uh,

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Speaker 1: the architect of a given building designed it was at

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Speaker 1: least some of these sensibilities in mind. Uh. But but

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Speaker 1: of course this is not always the case. Hopefully, but

429
00:23:19,440 --> 00:23:22,240
Speaker 1: maybe often not. Alright, So maybe we can take a

430
00:23:22,280 --> 00:23:23,960
Speaker 1: quick break, and then when we come back, we can

431
00:23:24,000 --> 00:23:27,840
Speaker 1: talk about ways that architecture impacts us in our minds.

432
00:23:28,480 --> 00:23:31,360
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434
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435
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436
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438
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459
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:06,280
Speaker 1: Are alright, we're back. We're talking about architecture of course. Now,

460
00:25:06,320 --> 00:25:08,520
Speaker 1: just of course reminder, Joe and I are not architects.

461
00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:11,880
Speaker 1: Uh but but what we know that some of you

462
00:25:11,960 --> 00:25:15,040
Speaker 1: out there are architects or have some sort of architectural background.

463
00:25:15,080 --> 00:25:17,880
Speaker 1: So that's right. We've heard from architects before. So as

464
00:25:17,880 --> 00:25:21,480
Speaker 1: always we're happy to to hear from our listeners on

465
00:25:21,520 --> 00:25:25,320
Speaker 1: these topics, to be corrected as need be. But but generally,

466
00:25:25,359 --> 00:25:27,919
Speaker 1: you know, if you just have additional UH info to

467
00:25:28,000 --> 00:25:31,480
Speaker 1: add additional examples, especially as we start getting into a

468
00:25:31,560 --> 00:25:34,679
Speaker 1: few examples of some of the the the architecture and

469
00:25:34,800 --> 00:25:37,560
Speaker 1: architectural principles that will be discussing here. Before the break,

470
00:25:37,600 --> 00:25:40,480
Speaker 1: we were talking about the natural world and how we've

471
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:43,520
Speaker 1: evolved to thrive in the natural world, and how our

472
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:47,040
Speaker 1: senses are there to help us navigate that natural world.

473
00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:50,000
Speaker 1: But now, of course we live UH to a very

474
00:25:50,080 --> 00:25:53,440
Speaker 1: large degree in an unnatural world. Of all these various

475
00:25:53,920 --> 00:25:57,639
Speaker 1: boxes that we have designed that we have built out

476
00:25:57,760 --> 00:26:02,600
Speaker 1: of natural uh naturally a hering materials hashtag box life.

477
00:26:03,400 --> 00:26:05,159
Speaker 1: So that quote I mentioned at the beginning of the

478
00:26:05,160 --> 00:26:08,879
Speaker 1: episode by Louis Khan, the American architect, about being a

479
00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:12,040
Speaker 1: different kind of person under one and fifty foot ceiling

480
00:26:12,640 --> 00:26:17,080
Speaker 1: UH that is referenced in a seventeen book by Sarah

481
00:26:17,200 --> 00:26:20,960
Speaker 1: Williams Goldhagen, who was the architecture critic for the New

482
00:26:21,320 --> 00:26:24,359
Speaker 1: New Republic for many years. She previously, I think, taught

483
00:26:24,400 --> 00:26:27,360
Speaker 1: at Harvard Graduate School School of Design, and now she's

484
00:26:27,359 --> 00:26:31,360
Speaker 1: an author, and in she published a book called Welcome

485
00:26:31,400 --> 00:26:34,640
Speaker 1: to Your World, How the Built Environment Shapes Our Lives

486
00:26:35,320 --> 00:26:38,280
Speaker 1: and Uh. This book makes the case that the built

487
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:42,199
Speaker 1: environments around us have profound impacts on our minds and

488
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:45,919
Speaker 1: our well being, and this relationship between architecture and the

489
00:26:46,000 --> 00:26:50,080
Speaker 1: quality of human life is undervalued in in the building,

490
00:26:50,560 --> 00:26:53,800
Speaker 1: the building world, and real estate development. And she argues

491
00:26:53,840 --> 00:26:56,560
Speaker 1: that good building design should not just be thought of

492
00:26:56,600 --> 00:26:59,960
Speaker 1: as kind of like an extravagance or a frivolous opulent

493
00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:02,679
Speaker 1: You know, architecture isn't like getting a vanity plate for

494
00:27:02,720 --> 00:27:07,000
Speaker 1: your car. It's actually a social good or a public service,

495
00:27:07,040 --> 00:27:11,119
Speaker 1: one that directly contributes significantly to the quality of life

496
00:27:11,240 --> 00:27:14,320
Speaker 1: of people who live in buildings and in urban environments.

497
00:27:14,680 --> 00:27:17,480
Speaker 1: Actually originally got interested in talking about the subject that

498
00:27:17,480 --> 00:27:20,480
Speaker 1: we're tackling today because I read a seventeen article in

499
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:23,960
Speaker 1: City Lab which featured an interview with Sarah Williams gold

500
00:27:24,040 --> 00:27:27,400
Speaker 1: Hagan promoting her book. And so gold Hagan mentions that

501
00:27:27,440 --> 00:27:29,920
Speaker 1: she was inspired to research and write this book after

502
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:32,800
Speaker 1: reading an older book that we've referenced on this show before,

503
00:27:33,320 --> 00:27:35,879
Speaker 1: Metaphors We Live By, published in nineteen eighty by the

504
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:40,200
Speaker 1: cognitive linguists George Lakeoff and the philosopher Mark Johnson. Uh,

505
00:27:40,320 --> 00:27:43,680
Speaker 1: don't remember what episode that came up in, but maybe

506
00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:46,080
Speaker 1: in one we did about like embodied cognition. Yeah, that

507
00:27:46,320 --> 00:27:48,720
Speaker 1: makes sense, so it talks about that. It's a book

508
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:51,440
Speaker 1: about the role of metaphors in our lives and our thinking,

509
00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:54,320
Speaker 1: and one concept that's explored in the book is the

510
00:27:54,400 --> 00:27:57,320
Speaker 1: role of our physical bodies in physical space as a

511
00:27:57,400 --> 00:28:01,520
Speaker 1: key metaphor for understanding our thoughts and emotion. So, for example,

512
00:28:01,760 --> 00:28:04,640
Speaker 1: happy is up and sad is down. Isn't that kind

513
00:28:04,640 --> 00:28:07,119
Speaker 1: of strange, like why would happy be up and sad

514
00:28:07,200 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 1: be down? But it seems like there's a there's a

515
00:28:09,480 --> 00:28:14,239
Speaker 1: sort of brute physical reality to those associations. Right, when

516
00:28:14,280 --> 00:28:18,040
Speaker 1: you're happy, you your posture literally lifts. You come up

517
00:28:18,080 --> 00:28:20,879
Speaker 1: and you're you're more Upright when you're sad, you droop.

518
00:28:21,480 --> 00:28:23,720
Speaker 1: This also reminds me of I think we've discussed studies

519
00:28:23,720 --> 00:28:27,360
Speaker 1: in the show before about walking around looking more up

520
00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:30,359
Speaker 1: or looking down. The idea of like looking up you're

521
00:28:30,400 --> 00:28:33,640
Speaker 1: more open to new experiences. You're looking down, you're more

522
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:35,880
Speaker 1: concerned with you know what, you may be tripping over

523
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:39,400
Speaker 1: or stepping in. Yeah, totally, But I mean just think

524
00:28:39,400 --> 00:28:43,200
Speaker 1: about the ways that these types of spatial metaphors and

525
00:28:43,280 --> 00:28:47,640
Speaker 1: body related metaphors utterly pervade our abstract and emotional thinking.

526
00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:50,680
Speaker 1: The way you can get over it, get over something.

527
00:28:50,720 --> 00:28:52,760
Speaker 1: What does that mean? Like, it's as if you are

528
00:28:52,880 --> 00:28:56,320
Speaker 1: standing over a person or an animal or something having

529
00:28:56,360 --> 00:28:59,760
Speaker 1: conquered it, or you're able to leap over a problem

530
00:28:59,800 --> 00:29:03,120
Speaker 1: and like, you know, get past it. I guess that's

531
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:07,800
Speaker 1: other another literal space metaphor um. And so this idea

532
00:29:07,840 --> 00:29:10,560
Speaker 1: inspired her to think more about the way is that

533
00:29:10,680 --> 00:29:14,720
Speaker 1: our physical space, the physical spaces that we occupy, literally

534
00:29:14,920 --> 00:29:18,959
Speaker 1: shape our thinking about our emotional lives and so and

535
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:21,160
Speaker 1: it turns out there's actually a good amount of research

536
00:29:21,240 --> 00:29:24,000
Speaker 1: that already highlights this fact, and so she explores a

537
00:29:24,000 --> 00:29:27,080
Speaker 1: lot of this in her book and uh Goldhagen gives

538
00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:32,160
Speaker 1: some examples of ways that current building and architecture projects

539
00:29:32,160 --> 00:29:35,560
Speaker 1: often undervalue things that we already know about the human

540
00:29:35,600 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 1: experience of built environments, and one example she gives is

541
00:29:39,320 --> 00:29:45,040
Speaker 1: overall form of buildings versus the texture of surfaces. So

542
00:29:45,080 --> 00:29:48,040
Speaker 1: in this interview she says, quote, very often in cities,

543
00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 1: the overall form of buildings is given much more priority

544
00:29:52,360 --> 00:29:57,720
Speaker 1: than materials, surfaces, textures, and details. What we know about

545
00:29:57,760 --> 00:30:01,280
Speaker 1: the way we appropriate and experience places is that the

546
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:04,720
Speaker 1: overall form of a place is not what most dramatically

547
00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:08,080
Speaker 1: affects our experience of it. It's more what psychologists called

548
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:11,960
Speaker 1: the surface based cues. Uh So, I was looking for

549
00:30:12,160 --> 00:30:15,160
Speaker 1: research to support this, and I think here she's referring

550
00:30:15,200 --> 00:30:18,400
Speaker 1: to work, including the following study one by Jonathan S.

551
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:22,400
Speaker 1: Cant and Melvin Gooddale in cerebral cortex in two thousand

552
00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:26,280
Speaker 1: six called attention to form or surface properties modulates different

553
00:30:26,280 --> 00:30:30,760
Speaker 1: regions of human occipito temporal cortex. And so the basic

554
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:35,240
Speaker 1: ideas Goldhagen rights that compared to overall forms of buildings,

555
00:30:35,880 --> 00:30:40,280
Speaker 1: research indicates that surface based cues like materials and textures,

556
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:43,160
Speaker 1: you know, the kind of textures and details on walls

557
00:30:43,240 --> 00:30:46,920
Speaker 1: and things like that, elicit a more powerful quote whole body,

558
00:30:47,160 --> 00:30:51,040
Speaker 1: intersensory and emotional response. That these kind of things might

559
00:30:51,120 --> 00:30:55,120
Speaker 1: have a deeper access to our emotional well being than say,

560
00:30:55,160 --> 00:30:57,960
Speaker 1: the overall shape of a building. At large, wood you know,

561
00:30:58,000 --> 00:30:59,680
Speaker 1: and this is something worth keeping in mind. And next

562
00:30:59,680 --> 00:31:01,480
Speaker 1: time anyone out there takes a small child to a

563
00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:04,959
Speaker 1: museum where you're expressly told not to touch anything, you know,

564
00:31:05,120 --> 00:31:09,040
Speaker 1: like that. Obviously we need to connect with our environment

565
00:31:09,080 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 1: and like touch and uh you know, and the proper

566
00:31:11,720 --> 00:31:14,360
Speaker 1: understanding of the physical services of things that a big

567
00:31:14,360 --> 00:31:17,120
Speaker 1: part of that. Oh you're saying, like, yeah, yeah, like that. Well,

568
00:31:17,160 --> 00:31:20,840
Speaker 1: I think she's mainly talking about this individual sense, but touch. Obviously,

569
00:31:20,920 --> 00:31:26,440
Speaker 1: the desire to touch extends from our desire to process surfaces. Yeah,

570
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:28,560
Speaker 1: I think that actually makes sense. Then, Like a lot

571
00:31:28,600 --> 00:31:33,040
Speaker 1: of like the details and surfaces and textures and materials

572
00:31:33,080 --> 00:31:36,520
Speaker 1: that have the most emotional access to to our brains

573
00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:40,040
Speaker 1: that have that caused these deeper whole body feelings are

574
00:31:40,120 --> 00:31:42,520
Speaker 1: things that we want to like get right up with

575
00:31:42,640 --> 00:31:45,840
Speaker 1: and interact with directly. You can't really do that with like, say,

576
00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:49,360
Speaker 1: the overall form of a skyscraper. No, that's true. You

577
00:31:49,400 --> 00:31:51,280
Speaker 1: can certainly come up and touch part of it, but

578
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:55,560
Speaker 1: it's not the full experience totally. Uh So, she's arguing

579
00:31:55,640 --> 00:32:00,360
Speaker 1: sort of a more perfectly tuned neuroarchitecture might pay more

580
00:32:00,400 --> 00:32:04,640
Speaker 1: attention to what surfaces are made out of what physical

581
00:32:04,720 --> 00:32:07,840
Speaker 1: details and accents they have on them than to the

582
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 1: overall shape of the building. Though it's not like the

583
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:12,280
Speaker 1: overall shape of the building is meaningless, that that has

584
00:32:12,320 --> 00:32:15,240
Speaker 1: important implications to which will explore more as we go on.

585
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:18,600
Speaker 1: But a few more ideas discussed in a review of

586
00:32:18,640 --> 00:32:21,200
Speaker 1: her book, I was reading an architect magazine by Blaine

587
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:26,440
Speaker 1: Brownwell uh Goldhagan also says that architecture, to better suit

588
00:32:26,440 --> 00:32:28,720
Speaker 1: our minds, should strive for a kind of what she

589
00:32:28,760 --> 00:32:34,040
Speaker 1: calls patterned complexity. So this means it's neither complex in

590
00:32:34,040 --> 00:32:37,000
Speaker 1: a way that's confusing as to the building's purpose. Right,

591
00:32:37,040 --> 00:32:39,080
Speaker 1: you don't want to a building that's just kind of

592
00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:41,280
Speaker 1: assaulting your senses and you don't know where to go

593
00:32:41,400 --> 00:32:43,840
Speaker 1: or what to do. But at the same time you

594
00:32:43,920 --> 00:32:46,720
Speaker 1: don't She says, you don't want buildings that are simple

595
00:32:47,200 --> 00:32:51,760
Speaker 1: in ways that make them unnatural, boring, flat, and deadening.

596
00:32:52,200 --> 00:32:55,560
Speaker 1: That these have negative emotional qualities. The way I interpret

597
00:32:55,640 --> 00:32:57,360
Speaker 1: what she's saying here is I think it means you're

598
00:32:57,480 --> 00:33:00,240
Speaker 1: interested in if you're trying to create a build thing

599
00:33:00,280 --> 00:33:03,480
Speaker 1: for you know, for good cognitive, mental emotional health of

600
00:33:03,520 --> 00:33:06,560
Speaker 1: the people in it. You're searching for the kinds of

601
00:33:06,640 --> 00:33:11,760
Speaker 1: surface complexity that you might find in pleasing natural environments,

602
00:33:11,800 --> 00:33:15,440
Speaker 1: So making buildings that most resemble the features mirroring the

603
00:33:15,480 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 1: structure of the surface qualities of trees, the river, the

604
00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:22,240
Speaker 1: rock outcropping and the overlook and things like that. And

605
00:33:22,320 --> 00:33:26,160
Speaker 1: I absolutely find that this rings true to me in

606
00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:29,960
Speaker 1: the buildings that I like the most. Like, just before

607
00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:32,160
Speaker 1: we came into the studio, we were looking at a

608
00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:35,920
Speaker 1: picture of the Boston City Hall m which I know

609
00:33:36,040 --> 00:33:38,719
Speaker 1: is a is a controversial building. I think, like so

610
00:33:38,760 --> 00:33:41,680
Speaker 1: it's an example of brutalist architecture, and some people hate

611
00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:43,959
Speaker 1: it and some people like it, at least from the

612
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:45,680
Speaker 1: angle I was looking at a lot of the photos

613
00:33:45,680 --> 00:33:48,000
Speaker 1: of it. I really kind of like it because it

614
00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:51,600
Speaker 1: has it has some kind of varied size elements that

615
00:33:51,680 --> 00:33:54,760
Speaker 1: have some verticality to them that somehow make this big

616
00:33:54,800 --> 00:33:58,200
Speaker 1: concrete building in some ways look like a copse of

617
00:33:58,280 --> 00:34:00,920
Speaker 1: trees that you could go into. It's almost kind of

618
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:03,000
Speaker 1: a forest. Yeah, you showed me an image of it,

619
00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 1: and when I look at it at a at a

620
00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:08,640
Speaker 1: building like that, I find myself on some level like

621
00:34:08,920 --> 00:34:13,040
Speaker 1: probably not you know, you know, overtly, but at least subconsciously,

622
00:34:13,080 --> 00:34:14,920
Speaker 1: I'm thinking, Oh, there's a place I could hide, There's

623
00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:17,040
Speaker 1: another place I could hide. Wouldn't it be neat to

624
00:34:17,080 --> 00:34:19,960
Speaker 1: sort of lay up there or to you know, to

625
00:34:20,040 --> 00:34:23,360
Speaker 1: camp on that little ledge there, Like all these little

626
00:34:23,719 --> 00:34:27,200
Speaker 1: um observations are taking place even if I'm not actively

627
00:34:27,239 --> 00:34:29,280
Speaker 1: thinking about what it would be like to to scale

628
00:34:29,360 --> 00:34:31,960
Speaker 1: the building. I think you're exactly right. I respond to

629
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:34,279
Speaker 1: the same kinds of things, the nooks and crannies that

630
00:34:34,320 --> 00:34:38,000
Speaker 1: make a natural environment pleasing. Uh, you know, the idea

631
00:34:38,040 --> 00:34:40,080
Speaker 1: of rocks that you could get up on top of

632
00:34:40,200 --> 00:34:44,760
Speaker 1: little forests that you could wander into. That stuff feels good.

633
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:48,960
Speaker 1: And I think even the unnatural, even the architectural versions

634
00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:52,160
Speaker 1: of them made out of synthetic materials, feel good in

635
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:55,160
Speaker 1: the same kinds of ways. Yeah. Like one example that

636
00:34:55,160 --> 00:34:59,000
Speaker 1: comes to mind, it's it's neat to see a hill

637
00:34:59,160 --> 00:35:02,560
Speaker 1: or outcropping or something, or even a mountain and be

638
00:35:02,600 --> 00:35:05,080
Speaker 1: able to sort of plot the course of ascension. Yes,

639
00:35:05,520 --> 00:35:07,799
Speaker 1: But likewise, you can take of what is ultimately a

640
00:35:07,880 --> 00:35:11,799
Speaker 1: very unnatural environment, say the interior the Guggenheim Museum, which

641
00:35:11,840 --> 00:35:13,799
Speaker 1: is like what this I'm not even I don't even

642
00:35:13,800 --> 00:35:16,160
Speaker 1: have the architectural terminology to properly describe it. But it's

643
00:35:16,200 --> 00:35:18,640
Speaker 1: kind of like a spiral ramp up around a large

644
00:35:18,640 --> 00:35:21,960
Speaker 1: central space, right, And that's not something you would find

645
00:35:21,960 --> 00:35:24,960
Speaker 1: in nature. But when you look up from the bottom

646
00:35:24,960 --> 00:35:27,120
Speaker 1: of that the interior that museum, you see a path

647
00:35:27,160 --> 00:35:30,680
Speaker 1: of ascension. You see this, this winding trail going up

648
00:35:30,719 --> 00:35:33,520
Speaker 1: towards the top, and there's something in you that must

649
00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:36,160
Speaker 1: traverse it. Well, yeah, I think that's the same reason

650
00:35:36,760 --> 00:35:39,560
Speaker 1: that we respond so well to tall buildings with terraces,

651
00:35:40,000 --> 00:35:42,640
Speaker 1: you know, like stepped terraces look very pleasing to us.

652
00:35:42,640 --> 00:35:45,440
Speaker 1: I think maybe because there's some kind of instinctual We

653
00:35:45,480 --> 00:35:47,880
Speaker 1: can't know this for sure, but maybe because there's some

654
00:35:47,920 --> 00:35:50,280
Speaker 1: part of the brain that's looking at that and seeing

655
00:35:50,320 --> 00:35:51,960
Speaker 1: like that's the part that you could climb up to

656
00:35:52,120 --> 00:35:54,239
Speaker 1: and then you could get from there to here. Yeah,

657
00:35:54,400 --> 00:35:56,960
Speaker 1: it's well, it goes back to the ziggurat, the zigarat

658
00:35:57,000 --> 00:36:00,279
Speaker 1: as an artificial mountain and uh and therefore something that

659
00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:04,919
Speaker 1: is scalable and so Ziggorott like elements in buildings, there's

660
00:36:04,920 --> 00:36:08,200
Speaker 1: something irresistible about them. And as far as Ledges got

661
00:36:08,239 --> 00:36:10,239
Speaker 1: we were talking about this before we went in the

662
00:36:10,320 --> 00:36:14,000
Speaker 1: Chrysler building in New York City, beautiful skyscraper, you know,

663
00:36:14,040 --> 00:36:17,759
Speaker 1: classic skyscraper. But there's something about those those eagles at

664
00:36:17,800 --> 00:36:20,080
Speaker 1: the top. You know that you look at that and

665
00:36:20,120 --> 00:36:23,920
Speaker 1: you can't help but imagine yourself up there, standing on it,

666
00:36:24,000 --> 00:36:26,799
Speaker 1: or at least, you know, clutching it and crawling out

667
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:29,280
Speaker 1: on it. And and and likewise, you see in fiction

668
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:32,440
Speaker 1: various scenarios where superhero or some other figure is standing

669
00:36:32,480 --> 00:36:35,520
Speaker 1: there like, we can't help, but imaginement, Yeah, you gotta

670
00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:37,839
Speaker 1: put Batman there, you gotta put Spider Man there. Yeah,

671
00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:40,480
Speaker 1: Like sometimes it's probably too crowded, Like a superhero goes

672
00:36:40,560 --> 00:36:43,160
Speaker 1: up there for their selfie and it's just overrun. Yeah,

673
00:36:43,360 --> 00:36:45,520
Speaker 1: and then que the wing serpent comes flying out, and

674
00:36:45,560 --> 00:36:48,200
Speaker 1: then you never know what's gonna happen. But as much

675
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:50,440
Speaker 1: as I think in some ways it makes sense to

676
00:36:50,560 --> 00:36:55,480
Speaker 1: try to create buildings that, in various ways mimic natural

677
00:36:55,600 --> 00:36:59,360
Speaker 1: landscapes and natural architecture of things like trees and forests

678
00:36:59,360 --> 00:37:01,480
Speaker 1: and mountains and rock out croppings and all that kind

679
00:37:01,480 --> 00:37:04,480
Speaker 1: of thing, I think it's also equally important. And of

680
00:37:04,520 --> 00:37:07,520
Speaker 1: course Goldhagen makes this point that there's an essential value

681
00:37:07,560 --> 00:37:11,360
Speaker 1: for literal physical nature as well, like green spaces and

682
00:37:11,440 --> 00:37:14,919
Speaker 1: cities full of natural vegetation. Absolutely, and there's a there's

683
00:37:14,920 --> 00:37:16,799
Speaker 1: a lot of research to bear that out, some of

684
00:37:16,800 --> 00:37:19,320
Speaker 1: which we'll get into in the next episode. Yes, totally.

685
00:37:19,360 --> 00:37:21,799
Speaker 1: I mean she cites research we already mentioned this one

686
00:37:21,880 --> 00:37:25,759
Speaker 1: that hospital patients have been documented in some cases to

687
00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:29,160
Speaker 1: have quicker recoveries and take less pain medication when they

688
00:37:29,160 --> 00:37:33,040
Speaker 1: can see natural vegetation like trees. Um. But there's also

689
00:37:33,120 --> 00:37:35,920
Speaker 1: research apparently that she cites that access to green spaces

690
00:37:35,960 --> 00:37:41,560
Speaker 1: improves cognitive outcomes for school children, including reduced stress. Yeah, like, well,

691
00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:43,920
Speaker 1: one thing, this is one of those scenarios though, of course,

692
00:37:43,960 --> 00:37:48,640
Speaker 1: where you look at major cities and and really I think,

693
00:37:48,719 --> 00:37:51,280
Speaker 1: like if you think of major cities that you've traveled

694
00:37:51,320 --> 00:37:55,040
Speaker 1: to or even minor cities of try to think about

695
00:37:55,040 --> 00:37:58,200
Speaker 1: your key memories. For me, anyway, I find my key

696
00:37:58,239 --> 00:38:01,960
Speaker 1: memories are also are often visiting the green spaces, you know,

697
00:38:02,040 --> 00:38:03,560
Speaker 1: Like when I think of New York, I think of

698
00:38:04,200 --> 00:38:08,080
Speaker 1: of Central Park, you know, I think of uh, for instance,

699
00:38:08,400 --> 00:38:11,000
Speaker 1: guang Zou or not in China. When I was in

700
00:38:11,040 --> 00:38:13,120
Speaker 1: both of those cities, it was it's the parks that

701
00:38:13,200 --> 00:38:16,560
Speaker 1: are that are the public spaces, the green spaces that

702
00:38:16,560 --> 00:38:19,200
Speaker 1: that really burn in my memory the most when I

703
00:38:19,239 --> 00:38:21,520
Speaker 1: was recently in London. I mean, of course I love

704
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:25,760
Speaker 1: the the interesting interior spaces of the cathedrals and the museums,

705
00:38:25,800 --> 00:38:27,920
Speaker 1: but one of the main things that sticks in my

706
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:30,759
Speaker 1: head is walking through like the palace gardens they just said,

707
00:38:30,800 --> 00:38:34,000
Speaker 1: like trees and open green spaces and and lots of

708
00:38:34,040 --> 00:38:37,439
Speaker 1: birds flocking about. And of course the thing with cities though,

709
00:38:37,520 --> 00:38:40,640
Speaker 1: is so yes, there are some wonderful examples of of

710
00:38:40,840 --> 00:38:43,920
Speaker 1: green spaces, and in many cases public green spaces, but

711
00:38:43,960 --> 00:38:46,799
Speaker 1: then there are also plenty of examples of portions of

712
00:38:46,800 --> 00:38:49,160
Speaker 1: some of those same cities that maybe don't have the

713
00:38:49,160 --> 00:38:51,319
Speaker 1: same amount of green space, that don't have as much

714
00:38:51,520 --> 00:38:54,800
Speaker 1: public access to green space. And there you see the

715
00:38:55,200 --> 00:38:57,319
Speaker 1: flip side of the equation. Well, yeah, and I think

716
00:38:57,360 --> 00:39:00,800
Speaker 1: one way of reframing this is that not having access

717
00:39:00,840 --> 00:39:03,760
Speaker 1: to green space is a real like cost to people

718
00:39:03,880 --> 00:39:06,879
Speaker 1: like that they pay a price for this mentally, emotionally,

719
00:39:07,239 --> 00:39:11,760
Speaker 1: psychologically for not having access to two trees and grass

720
00:39:11,880 --> 00:39:14,400
Speaker 1: and the sounds birds, And I mean as much as

721
00:39:14,440 --> 00:39:17,760
Speaker 1: a I guess that sounds like a cliche, but uh,

722
00:39:18,000 --> 00:39:21,200
Speaker 1: it appears that this really matters. Yeah, But it's it's

723
00:39:21,200 --> 00:39:23,760
Speaker 1: easy for I think developers and just people in general

724
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:26,160
Speaker 1: to forget this for periods of time, and then you

725
00:39:26,200 --> 00:39:28,480
Speaker 1: have to have individuals come along and say, you know,

726
00:39:28,600 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 1: we need to put green space back in, we need

727
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,680
Speaker 1: to plant trees. Uh. Here in Atlanta, this was I

728
00:39:33,719 --> 00:39:35,600
Speaker 1: understand to be there have been the case for a while.

729
00:39:36,080 --> 00:39:39,239
Speaker 1: Uh where in the downtown area you just had a

730
00:39:39,280 --> 00:39:42,280
Speaker 1: shrinking amount of green space. And then you had organizations

731
00:39:42,360 --> 00:39:45,239
Speaker 1: like Trees Atlanta came along and uh and you know,

732
00:39:45,280 --> 00:39:49,000
Speaker 1: took up the initiative of planting more trees and and

733
00:39:49,120 --> 00:39:51,359
Speaker 1: making sure that there there were trees around, there were

734
00:39:51,360 --> 00:39:54,239
Speaker 1: green spaces, there was room for nature to exist in

735
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:58,520
Speaker 1: the sort of concrete environments that we were creating. Yeah,

736
00:39:58,640 --> 00:40:00,400
Speaker 1: and so I think that's the It's got to be

737
00:40:00,400 --> 00:40:02,319
Speaker 1: a crucial part of architecture. I mean, I guess that's

738
00:40:02,360 --> 00:40:05,520
Speaker 1: different from just when you're making a building. That's more

739
00:40:05,640 --> 00:40:08,440
Speaker 1: broadly like urban planning and that kind of thing. Though,

740
00:40:08,440 --> 00:40:09,839
Speaker 1: I guess it also has to do with you know,

741
00:40:10,200 --> 00:40:11,919
Speaker 1: like you've got a certain plot of land and you're

742
00:40:11,920 --> 00:40:14,680
Speaker 1: developing it, how much of that plot of land will

743
00:40:14,719 --> 00:40:17,160
Speaker 1: you devote to just like having space where you can

744
00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:19,960
Speaker 1: plant trees. In a lot of times, I'm sure developers

745
00:40:19,960 --> 00:40:22,280
Speaker 1: would look at that and say, well, that's just wasted revenue.

746
00:40:22,320 --> 00:40:25,680
Speaker 1: You could fill that in with the units you can fill. Yeah,

747
00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:27,719
Speaker 1: we see this all the time. I'm sure a lot

748
00:40:27,760 --> 00:40:29,560
Speaker 1: of our listeners see this. We see this in Atlanta,

749
00:40:29,680 --> 00:40:33,080
Speaker 1: especially where a lot is purchased and then a developer

750
00:40:33,080 --> 00:40:35,080
Speaker 1: will come in and they will build just as much,

751
00:40:35,400 --> 00:40:39,320
Speaker 1: absolutely as much house is possible as is physically possible

752
00:40:39,320 --> 00:40:42,640
Speaker 1: on the lot, and you know, lawn and green space

753
00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:45,879
Speaker 1: trees be damned. Uh. And then you know someone comes

754
00:40:45,880 --> 00:40:48,600
Speaker 1: along and they buy it, but it's just it's all house. Now,

755
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:53,320
Speaker 1: speaking about the psychological effects of of built environments and architecture,

756
00:40:53,400 --> 00:40:55,160
Speaker 1: I want to come back to the thing we talked

757
00:40:55,160 --> 00:40:57,680
Speaker 1: about at the beginning of the episode. Remember that quote

758
00:40:57,680 --> 00:41:00,280
Speaker 1: from Louis Kahan talking about bathing in a poll all

759
00:41:00,320 --> 00:41:03,279
Speaker 1: setting versus in a regular bathtub in a little room.

760
00:41:03,400 --> 00:41:06,200
Speaker 1: Something about a hundred and fifty foot ceiling just makes

761
00:41:06,239 --> 00:41:09,240
Speaker 1: a person a different kind of person. If a person

762
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:12,920
Speaker 1: is different under a majestic high ceiling, how and why, like,

763
00:41:13,080 --> 00:41:16,560
Speaker 1: is there any empirical evidence for that other than your hunch?

764
00:41:17,160 --> 00:41:19,560
Speaker 1: And if so, why would that be true. So I

765
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:21,520
Speaker 1: want to actually look at a few studies here. All right,

766
00:41:21,600 --> 00:41:23,920
Speaker 1: let's do it. So the first one I will want

767
00:41:23,920 --> 00:41:27,319
Speaker 1: to look at is by Vartanian at all in the

768
00:41:27,440 --> 00:41:32,920
Speaker 1: Journal of Environmental Psychology, published called Architectural Design in the Brain.

769
00:41:33,080 --> 00:41:37,680
Speaker 1: Effects of ceiling height and perceived enclosure on beauty judgment

770
00:41:37,840 --> 00:41:42,000
Speaker 1: and approach avoidance decisions. Uh So, there were some basic

771
00:41:42,040 --> 00:41:45,560
Speaker 1: findings here. First of all, rooms with high ceilings were

772
00:41:45,640 --> 00:41:48,560
Speaker 1: judged as more beautiful than rooms with low ceilings. I

773
00:41:48,600 --> 00:41:50,320
Speaker 1: think there should be no surprise there. I mean that

774
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,000
Speaker 1: just totally goes to their intuition. You think of like

775
00:41:53,040 --> 00:41:55,759
Speaker 1: the cathedrals and the high ceiling palaces tend to be

776
00:41:55,800 --> 00:42:00,000
Speaker 1: more beautiful but more interesting. Through the use of addition

777
00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:03,160
Speaker 1: a psychological testing and neuroimaging with f m r I,

778
00:42:04,000 --> 00:42:08,120
Speaker 1: rooms with high ceilings were shown to elicit activity in

779
00:42:08,320 --> 00:42:14,120
Speaker 1: quote structures involved in visuospatial exploration and attention in the

780
00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:18,200
Speaker 1: dorsal stream. Uh so. The dorsal stream is a concept

781
00:42:18,239 --> 00:42:20,920
Speaker 1: that's part of a hypothesis in neuroscience known as the

782
00:42:20,920 --> 00:42:25,280
Speaker 1: too stream hypothesis. Basically, the idea is that the brain

783
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:29,400
Speaker 1: has two main routes for processing perception of visual or

784
00:42:29,440 --> 00:42:33,759
Speaker 1: auditory stimuli. You get the ventral stream, also known as

785
00:42:33,800 --> 00:42:36,600
Speaker 1: the what stream or the what process, and that's used

786
00:42:36,640 --> 00:42:41,400
Speaker 1: primarily for identifying and recognizing things. What is that? And

787
00:42:41,400 --> 00:42:43,719
Speaker 1: then you've got the dorsal stream, also known as the

788
00:42:43,880 --> 00:42:47,560
Speaker 1: war stream or the wear process, and that's associated with

789
00:42:47,840 --> 00:42:51,200
Speaker 1: plenty of other things, but primarily with assessing where a

790
00:42:51,320 --> 00:42:55,080
Speaker 1: perceived object is in space relative to the viewer and

791
00:42:55,200 --> 00:42:59,200
Speaker 1: in guiding action through space. So it seems that compared

792
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:02,760
Speaker 1: to rooms with lower ceilings, this study found that open

793
00:43:02,880 --> 00:43:06,799
Speaker 1: rooms with higher ceilings engage brain structure is associated with

794
00:43:06,920 --> 00:43:12,239
Speaker 1: exploring spaces, whereas open rooms. Open rooms were also more

795
00:43:12,280 --> 00:43:15,080
Speaker 1: likely to engage parts of the brain that perceive a

796
00:43:15,200 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 1: visual motions. I think open rooms would seem to prime

797
00:43:18,160 --> 00:43:21,880
Speaker 1: you to see things moving around. Meanwhile, the same study

798
00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:26,880
Speaker 1: found that more enclosed spaces tended to trigger avoidance behaviors

799
00:43:26,920 --> 00:43:31,440
Speaker 1: and stimulate quote exit decisions, as well as showing increased

800
00:43:31,440 --> 00:43:35,600
Speaker 1: activation in the anterior mid singulate cortex and the author's

801
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:39,240
Speaker 1: right quote. This suggests that a reduction in perceived visual

802
00:43:39,560 --> 00:43:45,160
Speaker 1: and locomotive permeability characteristic of enclosed spaces might elicit an

803
00:43:45,160 --> 00:43:49,360
Speaker 1: emotional reaction that accompanies exit decisions. So, if I'm interpreting

804
00:43:49,360 --> 00:43:51,320
Speaker 1: this right, I think that's a technical way of saying

805
00:43:51,640 --> 00:43:55,040
Speaker 1: that more enclosed spaces are likely, on average to trigger

806
00:43:55,160 --> 00:43:58,759
Speaker 1: less activity in the brain that says, let's explore, and

807
00:43:58,840 --> 00:44:00,840
Speaker 1: more activity in the st uture of the brain that

808
00:44:00,840 --> 00:44:03,399
Speaker 1: says it's time to get out. Now, I think that's

809
00:44:03,440 --> 00:44:06,480
Speaker 1: really interesting, the idea that higher ceilings might sort of

810
00:44:06,520 --> 00:44:09,720
Speaker 1: trigger activity in the brain that says it's time to explore,

811
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:12,040
Speaker 1: time to map, time to time to get into it.

812
00:44:12,600 --> 00:44:16,799
Speaker 1: But I also wonder how this this connects intention with

813
00:44:16,840 --> 00:44:20,640
Speaker 1: the idea that smaller spaces can sometimes be perceived as say, cozy,

814
00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:24,840
Speaker 1: Like the perception of coziness somehow seems like the opposite

815
00:44:24,840 --> 00:44:28,400
Speaker 1: of an exit or avoidance motivation. And yet you can

816
00:44:28,400 --> 00:44:31,480
Speaker 1: clearly think of times winning closed spaces are cozier than

817
00:44:31,520 --> 00:44:34,759
Speaker 1: a big open space. Yeah, but they tend to when

818
00:44:34,760 --> 00:44:36,480
Speaker 1: I think of them, I tend to think of environments

819
00:44:36,480 --> 00:44:38,399
Speaker 1: where I am going to like climb into a bed

820
00:44:38,480 --> 00:44:41,400
Speaker 1: or sleeping bag or something, you know, as opposed to

821
00:44:41,480 --> 00:44:46,439
Speaker 1: somewhere where I'm going to engage in something more like work. Uh,

822
00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:48,160
Speaker 1: you know, like if I'm gonna snuggle up with a

823
00:44:48,200 --> 00:44:50,839
Speaker 1: really good book. Then yes, I might think of some

824
00:44:51,320 --> 00:44:54,120
Speaker 1: of being in some casket like chamber on a train

825
00:44:54,360 --> 00:44:59,240
Speaker 1: or a ship or so forth. Yeah, that's an interesting

826
00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:01,400
Speaker 1: that it has to to do with what types of

827
00:45:02,040 --> 00:45:05,319
Speaker 1: things you're about to do. Um. But like but like,

828
00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:08,040
Speaker 1: for instance, a kitchen. I've never heard anyone say, oh,

829
00:45:08,080 --> 00:45:10,480
Speaker 1: I wish I had a cozier kitchen in which to

830
00:45:11,280 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 1: you know, engage my culinary exploration. No, people want bigger kitchens.

831
00:45:17,080 --> 00:45:19,560
Speaker 1: They probably envisioned a kitchen with a with you know,

832
00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:22,680
Speaker 1: reasonably high ceiling, probably maybe not a cathedral ceiling. But

833
00:45:23,400 --> 00:45:27,160
Speaker 1: I don't think anybody gets excited about a super tight

834
00:45:27,280 --> 00:45:31,120
Speaker 1: little ship galley of a of a kitchen. That's interesting. Yeah,

835
00:45:31,160 --> 00:45:34,400
Speaker 1: it's like it's almost like you want big spaces to

836
00:45:34,400 --> 00:45:37,200
Speaker 1: to do work and to think about big questions and

837
00:45:37,280 --> 00:45:39,840
Speaker 1: to think of you know, and to to explore ideas,

838
00:45:39,880 --> 00:45:42,719
Speaker 1: and then you want small spaces in order to have

839
00:45:42,840 --> 00:45:46,680
Speaker 1: privacy and feel secure and sleep. Yeah. And I guess

840
00:45:46,680 --> 00:45:48,359
Speaker 1: it also has to do with the scale of the work, right.

841
00:45:48,400 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: It's one thing to think about, say, painting miniatures and

842
00:45:51,120 --> 00:45:53,840
Speaker 1: being an a tying a cozy it's a space. But

843
00:45:53,920 --> 00:45:56,880
Speaker 1: when you're cooking, you're doing something that probably is making

844
00:45:57,200 --> 00:46:01,839
Speaker 1: making a mess and engaging you know, so few different appliances, etcetera. Well,

845
00:46:01,840 --> 00:46:03,319
Speaker 1: it may have to do with whether or not you're

846
00:46:03,320 --> 00:46:05,520
Speaker 1: trying to be creative. That'll come in in the study

847
00:46:05,520 --> 00:46:07,760
Speaker 1: you want to talk about in a second. But another

848
00:46:07,800 --> 00:46:11,480
Speaker 1: thing that's intention here. I think. For example, Goldhagen refers

849
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:16,160
Speaker 1: to some research that suggests, quite unsurprisingly that closed spaces

850
00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:19,320
Speaker 1: give people a sense of refuge and security. Okay, that

851
00:46:19,600 --> 00:46:22,560
Speaker 1: makes sense, um, But I think of how many like

852
00:46:22,719 --> 00:46:26,640
Speaker 1: office workers, including maybe some people in this room, you

853
00:46:26,760 --> 00:46:30,359
Speaker 1: arned for the days of cubicles and little offices as

854
00:46:30,360 --> 00:46:34,399
Speaker 1: opposed to the modern scourge of open office plans, where

855
00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 1: you are supposed to on paper, benefit from constant collaboration,

856
00:46:38,960 --> 00:46:41,399
Speaker 1: but in fact they just well, I mean, I don't

857
00:46:41,400 --> 00:46:43,560
Speaker 1: want to speak for everybody, but for many people they

858
00:46:43,560 --> 00:46:46,279
Speaker 1: clearly just make you feel distracted and on edge all

859
00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:48,840
Speaker 1: the time. Yeah. I was reading a little bout a

860
00:46:48,840 --> 00:46:50,719
Speaker 1: bit about about this as well, And it's one of

861
00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:54,480
Speaker 1: those things where you can find some some material to

862
00:46:54,520 --> 00:46:57,440
Speaker 1: back up either case basically, and you can find individuals

863
00:46:57,480 --> 00:46:59,960
Speaker 1: i'm sure, with different experiences to back up either case.

864
00:47:00,280 --> 00:47:02,160
Speaker 1: I also think it depends on what sort of work

865
00:47:02,200 --> 00:47:05,400
Speaker 1: you're in, Like, to what extent is your work communal

866
00:47:06,000 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: between individuals, or to what extent is it you know,

867
00:47:10,440 --> 00:47:13,680
Speaker 1: is it a situation where this this individual is doing

868
00:47:13,719 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 1: their own thing for extended periods of time and it's

869
00:47:15,800 --> 00:47:18,080
Speaker 1: better not to bother them. And that can vary. That

870
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:20,440
Speaker 1: not only varies from person to person in company to company,

871
00:47:20,560 --> 00:47:24,520
Speaker 1: it can vary from department to department within a single entity. Obviously,

872
00:47:24,920 --> 00:47:28,880
Speaker 1: where maybe maybe the advertising department of a particular company

873
00:47:29,040 --> 00:47:31,600
Speaker 1: is more about running from desk to desk and talking

874
00:47:31,600 --> 00:47:34,320
Speaker 1: about what they're working on. Likewise, people have more of

875
00:47:34,360 --> 00:47:37,400
Speaker 1: a research role, might need to just be you know,

876
00:47:37,600 --> 00:47:39,920
Speaker 1: have the blinders on right. How much of your job

877
00:47:40,120 --> 00:47:43,680
Speaker 1: involves the need for deep work? Yeah, yeah, so, But

878
00:47:43,840 --> 00:47:46,600
Speaker 1: obviously they're going to be different effects and tendencies playing

879
00:47:46,600 --> 00:47:49,319
Speaker 1: against each other in the design of interior spaces. There's

880
00:47:49,360 --> 00:47:51,840
Speaker 1: clearly not a one size fits all, like all interior

881
00:47:51,880 --> 00:47:55,680
Speaker 1: spaces should be like x UM. But yeah, one thing

882
00:47:55,719 --> 00:47:58,839
Speaker 1: I was also wondering about with the idea of like

883
00:47:58,920 --> 00:48:04,600
Speaker 1: approach versus of ouidence behaviors, exploration motivation versus exit motivation.

884
00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:06,600
Speaker 1: You know, if you were were more likely to get

885
00:48:06,680 --> 00:48:10,600
Speaker 1: the brain into exploration mode in rooms with high ceilings.

886
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:14,560
Speaker 1: Could that have abstract implications? Could these exploration and exit

887
00:48:14,640 --> 00:48:19,640
Speaker 1: behaviors also lead to broader emotions, motivations, and cognitive potential?

888
00:48:20,000 --> 00:48:21,839
Speaker 1: And I did find at least one study that would

889
00:48:21,880 --> 00:48:25,600
Speaker 1: seem to support this. This was by Joan Myers, Levy

890
00:48:25,680 --> 00:48:29,080
Speaker 1: and Rui Jou published in the Journal of Consumer Research

891
00:48:29,120 --> 00:48:31,640
Speaker 1: in two thousand and seven called the Influence of Ceiling

892
00:48:31,719 --> 00:48:34,880
Speaker 1: Height the Effects of priming on the type of processing

893
00:48:34,920 --> 00:48:38,040
Speaker 1: that people use. And so what happened here is that

894
00:48:38,120 --> 00:48:42,040
Speaker 1: researchers found that even relatively small differences in ceiling heights,

895
00:48:42,040 --> 00:48:44,200
Speaker 1: say like the difference between an eight foot ceiling and

896
00:48:44,200 --> 00:48:48,440
Speaker 1: a tin foot ceiling, these had noticeable effects on psychology

897
00:48:48,440 --> 00:48:52,759
Speaker 1: and cognition. UH not very surprisingly, rooms with higher ceilings

898
00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:57,440
Speaker 1: primed people to think about words and concepts related to freedom,

899
00:48:57,920 --> 00:49:00,520
Speaker 1: whereas rooms with lower ceilings were more were likely to

900
00:49:00,560 --> 00:49:04,359
Speaker 1: prime people to think about words and concepts related to confinement.

901
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:07,520
Speaker 1: And they measured this UH this priming effect by seeing,

902
00:49:07,560 --> 00:49:09,880
Speaker 1: like what types of words people were more likely to

903
00:49:09,920 --> 00:49:13,880
Speaker 1: solve foreign puzzles like anagrams. A common way of testing

904
00:49:13,920 --> 00:49:16,520
Speaker 1: for like priming on certain concepts and words. You know,

905
00:49:16,560 --> 00:49:18,640
Speaker 1: are are you already kind of like having this sort

906
00:49:18,680 --> 00:49:22,640
Speaker 1: of thing in mind? Um? But more interestingly, the author

907
00:49:22,680 --> 00:49:26,520
Speaker 1: has also suggested these broader cognitive effects that higher ceilings

908
00:49:27,120 --> 00:49:32,680
Speaker 1: make people more likely to use abstract relational cognition, like

909
00:49:32,760 --> 00:49:37,799
Speaker 1: thinking about the abstract relationships between ideas and things, whereas

910
00:49:38,280 --> 00:49:40,840
Speaker 1: lower ceilings were more likely to make people think in

911
00:49:40,960 --> 00:49:45,759
Speaker 1: terms of concrete objects and specific details. And I can

912
00:49:45,800 --> 00:49:48,680
Speaker 1: think if they're correct about this, this makes me think

913
00:49:48,960 --> 00:49:52,440
Speaker 1: obviously that you could have different types of workspaces being

914
00:49:52,480 --> 00:49:55,680
Speaker 1: more suited to different kinds of work, Like the kind

915
00:49:55,719 --> 00:49:57,399
Speaker 1: of the kind of work where you need to be

916
00:49:57,480 --> 00:50:00,799
Speaker 1: creative and think abstract things might want to have a

917
00:50:00,920 --> 00:50:02,799
Speaker 1: room with a big, high ceiling. The kind of work

918
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:06,280
Speaker 1: where you're focusing in on my new concrete details of things,

919
00:50:06,560 --> 00:50:09,359
Speaker 1: you might want a smaller space with a lower ceiling. So,

920
00:50:09,520 --> 00:50:13,600
Speaker 1: if I'm understanding this correctly, you're you're going to ask

921
00:50:13,600 --> 00:50:17,120
Speaker 1: our employers for custom offices in which there is a

922
00:50:17,239 --> 00:50:20,959
Speaker 1: ceiling that can be manipulated via remote control. Sure, yeah,

923
00:50:21,040 --> 00:50:23,880
Speaker 1: Raisin lower, Yeah, Yeah, that makes sense to me. Again,

924
00:50:23,920 --> 00:50:27,120
Speaker 1: this does seem to roughly fit with personal experience, like

925
00:50:27,160 --> 00:50:29,560
Speaker 1: I can think of what happens when you go into

926
00:50:29,600 --> 00:50:32,200
Speaker 1: a cathedral or a palatial atmosphere. I mean it does

927
00:50:32,280 --> 00:50:34,960
Speaker 1: tend to in a way sort of elevate one's thinking.

928
00:50:35,400 --> 00:50:38,279
Speaker 1: You are more likely to think about big ideas in

929
00:50:38,360 --> 00:50:41,160
Speaker 1: there somehow, at least in my experience. No, that's that

930
00:50:41,200 --> 00:50:43,320
Speaker 1: would say, that's my experience as well, not only with

931
00:50:43,320 --> 00:50:47,439
Speaker 1: with human made environments, but even we've we've talked before

932
00:50:47,440 --> 00:50:50,560
Speaker 1: about say seeing the Grand Canyon or something like that.

933
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:52,319
Speaker 1: You know, it is a lot to see a large

934
00:50:52,360 --> 00:50:57,400
Speaker 1: empty space. That kind of environment summons, uh, you know,

935
00:50:57,760 --> 00:51:02,480
Speaker 1: a certain amount of introspection and and you know, thinking

936
00:51:02,520 --> 00:51:06,200
Speaker 1: about it eternity and so forth. Um, I mean the

937
00:51:06,239 --> 00:51:11,200
Speaker 1: big spaces have inspired big thoughts for some reason. Yeah.

938
00:51:11,239 --> 00:51:13,239
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I mean we were just

939
00:51:13,280 --> 00:51:15,600
Speaker 1: talking about what kinds of work are are small space

940
00:51:15,680 --> 00:51:18,120
Speaker 1: is good for. I mean I miss my cubicle from

941
00:51:18,120 --> 00:51:21,400
Speaker 1: the old days, especially at times when I want to

942
00:51:21,560 --> 00:51:25,359
Speaker 1: like really zero in on, like editing a document. You

943
00:51:25,400 --> 00:51:28,439
Speaker 1: know that it's almost like the the the enclosure helps

944
00:51:28,480 --> 00:51:32,279
Speaker 1: you stay on task with minute details of things. Yeah,

945
00:51:32,280 --> 00:51:35,080
Speaker 1: it almost literally becomes like like the blinders of a horse,

946
00:51:35,480 --> 00:51:37,960
Speaker 1: Like you can't just look up and see what everybody

947
00:51:37,960 --> 00:51:40,480
Speaker 1: in the office is doing, uh you know, and and

948
00:51:40,480 --> 00:51:43,120
Speaker 1: and gaze up and inspect every little slight movement that

949
00:51:43,160 --> 00:51:45,640
Speaker 1: occurs in your peripheral vision. All right, on that note,

950
00:51:45,640 --> 00:51:47,279
Speaker 1: we're going to take one more break, but we'll be

951
00:51:47,400 --> 00:51:53,440
Speaker 1: right back. All right, we're back. So we've been talking

952
00:51:53,480 --> 00:51:57,359
Speaker 1: about the psychology of architecture, how the built environment, uh

953
00:51:57,760 --> 00:52:01,280
Speaker 1: you know, influences us psychologically and how it shapes our lives.

954
00:52:01,640 --> 00:52:04,680
Speaker 1: One other thing I was looking at was studies about

955
00:52:05,200 --> 00:52:08,040
Speaker 1: color and interior spaces, because yeah, you have to paint

956
00:52:08,040 --> 00:52:10,120
Speaker 1: it some color. You have to pick out some color

957
00:52:10,120 --> 00:52:12,080
Speaker 1: of carpet. Oh, you don't necessarily have to paint it.

958
00:52:12,080 --> 00:52:15,120
Speaker 1: You could have just like say, exposed raw concrete. Right. Well, true,

959
00:52:15,160 --> 00:52:17,600
Speaker 1: but even that is a choice. In coloration, it is.

960
00:52:18,040 --> 00:52:20,480
Speaker 1: Uh So color psychology, we know, we've talked about on

961
00:52:20,520 --> 00:52:22,160
Speaker 1: the show before. It's a big field with a lot

962
00:52:22,200 --> 00:52:26,040
Speaker 1: of complicated and sometimes conflicting results. I think it's important

963
00:52:26,040 --> 00:52:28,480
Speaker 1: in color psychology. I mean, I guess this is important

964
00:52:28,480 --> 00:52:30,919
Speaker 1: for all things, but for some reason it especially comes

965
00:52:31,000 --> 00:52:34,560
Speaker 1: up in color psychology that, like plenty of psychological effects,

966
00:52:34,560 --> 00:52:37,600
Speaker 1: the effects of color on thinking, emotion, and motivation are

967
00:52:37,680 --> 00:52:40,600
Speaker 1: not necessarily universal to the human animal. They can be

968
00:52:40,640 --> 00:52:44,120
Speaker 1: influenced by differences in cultural associations. Right, Like, a big

969
00:52:44,120 --> 00:52:47,279
Speaker 1: one that I've read about before is red. Green and

970
00:52:47,320 --> 00:52:52,719
Speaker 1: red have certain connotations generally an American and Western um individuals,

971
00:52:52,760 --> 00:52:55,319
Speaker 1: where green is go, red is stop. So green is good,

972
00:52:55,400 --> 00:52:57,880
Speaker 1: red is bad. But you and so you might be

973
00:52:57,920 --> 00:53:00,839
Speaker 1: inclined to utilize that in your tech knowledgy and your

974
00:53:00,880 --> 00:53:03,160
Speaker 1: app or what have you. But then if you translate

975
00:53:03,200 --> 00:53:07,239
Speaker 1: that app or technology to a Chinese market, where a

976
00:53:07,400 --> 00:53:11,520
Speaker 1: red has a strongly uh you know, positive color, it

977
00:53:11,600 --> 00:53:13,880
Speaker 1: is a very noble color, like you would not associate

978
00:53:13,960 --> 00:53:18,200
Speaker 1: red with a negative outcome in Chinese culture. Right. So,

979
00:53:18,280 --> 00:53:21,680
Speaker 1: if you are actually using color psychology research to shape

980
00:53:21,760 --> 00:53:25,000
Speaker 1: the design of interior spaces, you would probably want to

981
00:53:25,040 --> 00:53:29,160
Speaker 1: consider research done on like cultures like the the culture

982
00:53:29,200 --> 00:53:32,520
Speaker 1: where you're making your building, right. Um. So, one example

983
00:53:32,520 --> 00:53:35,319
Speaker 1: of something that came across was a study from two

984
00:53:35,360 --> 00:53:39,080
Speaker 1: thousand nine published in the journal Science by Ravi, Meta

985
00:53:39,200 --> 00:53:42,640
Speaker 1: and Ruigu called Blue or Red Exploring the Effect of

986
00:53:42,719 --> 00:53:46,480
Speaker 1: color on cognitive task performances. And this was a study

987
00:53:46,520 --> 00:53:49,680
Speaker 1: looking at the color the effects of color on cognitive

988
00:53:49,680 --> 00:53:53,160
Speaker 1: performance without going deep into the details, all other things

989
00:53:53,200 --> 00:53:56,759
Speaker 1: being equal, and they found that red backgrounds tend to

990
00:53:56,840 --> 00:54:00,239
Speaker 1: make us more likely to engage in avoidance behavior years

991
00:54:00,640 --> 00:54:03,439
Speaker 1: and this was done among North Americans, so that might

992
00:54:03,440 --> 00:54:05,799
Speaker 1: not be surprising that maybe you could have some like

993
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:10,759
Speaker 1: stop signs stoplight associations at work there. But that read

994
00:54:10,880 --> 00:54:16,360
Speaker 1: also enhances performance on detail oriented tasks, such as specific

995
00:54:16,400 --> 00:54:19,440
Speaker 1: recall of details in a memory exercise, like if I

996
00:54:19,520 --> 00:54:23,520
Speaker 1: give you, um a list of words to remember, you

997
00:54:23,560 --> 00:54:27,360
Speaker 1: will get more words right in remembering, remembering them and

998
00:54:27,400 --> 00:54:30,840
Speaker 1: recalling them later with a red background, then with another

999
00:54:30,840 --> 00:54:35,680
Speaker 1: colored background. But meanwhile, they found that blue backgrounds tend

1000
00:54:35,719 --> 00:54:40,520
Speaker 1: to enhance performance on creative tasks e g. Coming up

1001
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:43,719
Speaker 1: with a list of creative uses for a mundane object

1002
00:54:43,840 --> 00:54:47,320
Speaker 1: like a brick, though there was some subjective judgment involved

1003
00:54:47,320 --> 00:54:49,719
Speaker 1: in evaluating those responses. They had like a panel of

1004
00:54:49,800 --> 00:54:54,480
Speaker 1: judges that were judging how creative the uses of the brick. Course, UM,

1005
00:54:54,600 --> 00:54:56,759
Speaker 1: So you know, I wouldn't take these results as ironclad,

1006
00:54:56,800 --> 00:54:59,719
Speaker 1: but if they're correct, if they're onto something here. One

1007
00:55:00,040 --> 00:55:05,400
Speaker 1: interesting association is the idea of blue, again with openness

1008
00:55:05,560 --> 00:55:10,000
Speaker 1: leading to creativity, So the idea of like blue environments,

1009
00:55:10,080 --> 00:55:12,880
Speaker 1: especially those with the same kind of hue as a

1010
00:55:12,960 --> 00:55:17,000
Speaker 1: blue sky, making people more creative, and that might seem

1011
00:55:17,080 --> 00:55:19,279
Speaker 1: to connect to the idea of being more creative or

1012
00:55:19,320 --> 00:55:23,520
Speaker 1: exploration oriented in open spaces rooms with tie high ceilings.

1013
00:55:24,000 --> 00:55:27,960
Speaker 1: Now we mentioned earlier educational outcomes, One interesting thing I

1014
00:55:28,040 --> 00:55:31,120
Speaker 1: was reading was another review of the gold Hagen book.

1015
00:55:31,440 --> 00:55:34,239
Speaker 1: I was reading an Education Week by an author named

1016
00:55:34,400 --> 00:55:37,960
Speaker 1: Sir John George, and this piece made reference to one

1017
00:55:38,000 --> 00:55:41,040
Speaker 1: of the most startling research findings that Goldhagen sites in

1018
00:55:41,040 --> 00:55:43,120
Speaker 1: in her book, which is as as expressed by the

1019
00:55:43,120 --> 00:55:46,319
Speaker 1: author of this piece quote one study of thirty four

1020
00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:54,919
Speaker 1: different British schools where the six design parameters of color, choice, complexity, flexibility, light,

1021
00:55:55,320 --> 00:56:00,200
Speaker 1: and connectivity affected a student's learning progress by twenty five scent.

1022
00:56:00,760 --> 00:56:03,560
Speaker 1: The difference in learning between the best and worst design

1023
00:56:03,640 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 1: classrooms was equal to the progress of an average student

1024
00:56:07,000 --> 00:56:12,160
Speaker 1: over an entire academic year. Yeah, and so with that

1025
00:56:12,239 --> 00:56:14,960
Speaker 1: kind of study, obviously an effect of that size I

1026
00:56:14,960 --> 00:56:18,120
Speaker 1: would be inclined to be skeptical about. You know, you know,

1027
00:56:18,200 --> 00:56:20,200
Speaker 1: you want to see that replicated a good amount. But

1028
00:56:21,000 --> 00:56:24,640
Speaker 1: even if the study somehow overstates the effect, even if

1029
00:56:24,680 --> 00:56:28,520
Speaker 1: the effect were only half that that that's an amazing difference. Um.

1030
00:56:28,800 --> 00:56:31,800
Speaker 1: So the author of this piece suggests that some extrapolations

1031
00:56:31,840 --> 00:56:34,839
Speaker 1: from this research should be used in schools. Just one

1032
00:56:34,880 --> 00:56:37,680
Speaker 1: example they give is, maybe is it a good idea

1033
00:56:37,800 --> 00:56:40,920
Speaker 1: when students misbehave to send them to a room that

1034
00:56:41,080 --> 00:56:44,600
Speaker 1: is like almost intentionally made to bore them on purpose,

1035
00:56:44,760 --> 00:56:47,040
Speaker 1: and you go to the detention room where you can

1036
00:56:47,080 --> 00:56:50,080
Speaker 1: sit and do nothing. Um, I mean, maybe it would

1037
00:56:50,120 --> 00:56:54,080
Speaker 1: be better to have a kind of like reparative discipline

1038
00:56:54,120 --> 00:56:57,799
Speaker 1: system where instead students who misbehave are sent to an

1039
00:56:57,840 --> 00:57:01,120
Speaker 1: outdoor green space with some vegetation in it. That that

1040
00:57:01,239 --> 00:57:04,000
Speaker 1: with the free range children, the free ranged children exactly.

1041
00:57:04,200 --> 00:57:06,920
Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's an interesting suggestion to me. I

1042
00:57:07,320 --> 00:57:10,080
Speaker 1: don't see any harm in trying things like that, absolutely.

1043
00:57:10,120 --> 00:57:12,080
Speaker 1: I mean, I know where I would rather go if

1044
00:57:12,120 --> 00:57:15,800
Speaker 1: I were sent to detention. The outdoor detention garden sounds

1045
00:57:15,880 --> 00:57:20,120
Speaker 1: much better than the detention chamber. Another specific example about

1046
00:57:20,160 --> 00:57:23,800
Speaker 1: built environments from Goldhagen's book that the author here mentions, uh,

1047
00:57:23,800 --> 00:57:26,160
Speaker 1: and I thought this was interesting was that there are

1048
00:57:26,160 --> 00:57:31,400
Speaker 1: apparently apparently some documented benefits to quote repeating patterns with

1049
00:57:31,560 --> 00:57:37,920
Speaker 1: respites from that same pattern, which can stimulate problem solving capacity.

1050
00:57:38,240 --> 00:57:40,440
Speaker 1: And this is very specific and I like it. I

1051
00:57:40,520 --> 00:57:42,640
Speaker 1: think I know exactly what this is referring to, Like

1052
00:57:43,280 --> 00:57:48,560
Speaker 1: when you see a building with pleasing irregularity in patterned elements,

1053
00:57:48,880 --> 00:57:52,320
Speaker 1: you know, so you have I guess an example would

1054
00:57:52,320 --> 00:57:53,880
Speaker 1: be like you say you've got a row of windows.

1055
00:57:53,880 --> 00:57:56,560
Speaker 1: You've got seven windows with alcoves, all in a row,

1056
00:57:56,880 --> 00:57:59,320
Speaker 1: and then suddenly where you'd expect the next one, there's

1057
00:57:59,360 --> 00:58:02,440
Speaker 1: not what. There's like a protruding feature rather than a window,

1058
00:58:03,080 --> 00:58:05,520
Speaker 1: And then the windows begin again. And maybe this happens

1059
00:58:05,520 --> 00:58:09,600
Speaker 1: at different levels with different irregular variation in that pattern.

1060
00:58:09,840 --> 00:58:11,560
Speaker 1: This reminds me of some of what we talked about

1061
00:58:11,560 --> 00:58:15,000
Speaker 1: in our episode of the Gods must be Counterintuitive, about

1062
00:58:15,040 --> 00:58:20,480
Speaker 1: how a certain amount of counter intuitive design is admirable

1063
00:58:20,480 --> 00:58:23,439
Speaker 1: in our myths and our stories, and therefore it would

1064
00:58:23,480 --> 00:58:26,200
Speaker 1: make sense in our architecture as well. Yes. Uh, the

1065
00:58:26,240 --> 00:58:28,800
Speaker 1: idea there, I think is that that kind of like

1066
00:58:29,440 --> 00:58:31,880
Speaker 1: it was like, they had to be minimally counterintuities. They

1067
00:58:31,880 --> 00:58:35,760
Speaker 1: can't be so counterintuitive that it just feels random. It

1068
00:58:35,800 --> 00:58:39,640
Speaker 1: needs to feel mostly structured, but with enough weirdness that

1069
00:58:39,760 --> 00:58:42,800
Speaker 1: it sticks in the memory. Yeah. Yeah, And and if

1070
00:58:42,840 --> 00:58:44,840
Speaker 1: you're looking at it like the natural environment, that makes

1071
00:58:44,840 --> 00:58:48,840
Speaker 1: sense too, Right, if you're considering a large hill to

1072
00:58:48,960 --> 00:58:51,000
Speaker 1: climb and you're sort of plotting your course up there,

1073
00:58:51,280 --> 00:58:54,040
Speaker 1: it makes sense that some of the visible ledges would

1074
00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:58,000
Speaker 1: be more pronounced than others are more desirable or more interesting,

1075
00:58:58,040 --> 00:59:01,400
Speaker 1: like there would be varied features and not and and

1076
00:59:01,440 --> 00:59:03,680
Speaker 1: there would be some features that might be more desirable

1077
00:59:03,720 --> 00:59:07,000
Speaker 1: than others, Like you know, it's something that is interesting

1078
00:59:07,000 --> 00:59:10,160
Speaker 1: to look at with big buildings, skyscrapers and whatnot, where

1079
00:59:10,200 --> 00:59:12,480
Speaker 1: you see something that is you see something that's an

1080
00:59:12,520 --> 00:59:14,640
Speaker 1: element or that maybe it's just the very top and

1081
00:59:14,680 --> 00:59:17,320
Speaker 1: maybe it's a penthouse or something like that, but it

1082
00:59:17,360 --> 00:59:19,720
Speaker 1: does you start stirring your mind. You're like, what kind

1083
00:59:19,760 --> 00:59:23,040
Speaker 1: of person lives there? What or what office is that?

1084
00:59:23,160 --> 00:59:26,640
Speaker 1: Who has access to that space in the building? Um?

1085
00:59:26,680 --> 00:59:28,320
Speaker 1: And then what is it like to stand there? I

1086
00:59:28,360 --> 00:59:30,400
Speaker 1: have I don't know if I'm alone in this, but

1087
00:59:30,520 --> 00:59:34,680
Speaker 1: I have have frequently had had weird dreams where I am,

1088
00:59:34,800 --> 00:59:37,400
Speaker 1: especially at a former location that we had where we

1089
00:59:37,440 --> 00:59:40,680
Speaker 1: had access to an outside terrace at our building. I

1090
00:59:40,720 --> 00:59:42,480
Speaker 1: would have dreams though where I would be it would

1091
00:59:42,520 --> 00:59:47,920
Speaker 1: be in in different strange skyscrapers, and and accessing terraces

1092
00:59:47,960 --> 00:59:51,320
Speaker 1: on those skyscrapers, uh, and and then looking out and

1093
00:59:51,360 --> 00:59:53,400
Speaker 1: it was like in an achievement to you know. It

1094
00:59:53,440 --> 00:59:55,000
Speaker 1: wasn't like I was sneaking in, but it was just

1095
00:59:55,360 --> 00:59:58,360
Speaker 1: it was I felt a sense of accomplishment by reaching

1096
00:59:58,400 --> 01:00:01,720
Speaker 1: those terraces. I haven't had those specific dreams, but as

1097
01:00:01,960 --> 01:00:04,360
Speaker 1: somebody who ever since I was a kid has loved

1098
01:00:04,360 --> 01:00:07,360
Speaker 1: to climb up on things, and as an adult, I

1099
01:00:07,760 --> 01:00:10,280
Speaker 1: wish it were more socially acceptable to just climb up

1100
01:00:10,320 --> 01:00:15,320
Speaker 1: on things with your inner goat. I totally identify with that.

1101
01:00:15,480 --> 01:00:18,440
Speaker 1: Not the dreams, but I know the feeling. Yeah, like

1102
01:00:18,480 --> 01:00:21,160
Speaker 1: if I see a fancy terrorists, I mean I want

1103
01:00:21,160 --> 01:00:22,760
Speaker 1: to stand up there. So I'm you know, kind of

1104
01:00:22,840 --> 01:00:25,640
Speaker 1: terrified of heights, but I still I still want to

1105
01:00:25,720 --> 01:00:28,320
Speaker 1: stand on on that terrorist. For some reason. This is funny.

1106
01:00:28,320 --> 01:00:31,440
Speaker 1: I have so many other neuroses and terrors, but for

1107
01:00:31,480 --> 01:00:34,000
Speaker 1: some reason I like heights. Yeah, it's what's it's your

1108
01:00:34,000 --> 01:00:37,600
Speaker 1: inner goat. I think it's the goat like desire to

1109
01:00:37,600 --> 01:00:41,200
Speaker 1: to stand atop something and look about. Now, there's one

1110
01:00:41,280 --> 01:00:44,120
Speaker 1: last thing I wanted to move to before we close

1111
01:00:44,200 --> 01:00:47,000
Speaker 1: out this first part of the discussion here, and it

1112
01:00:47,080 --> 01:00:52,320
Speaker 1: was a question about I wonder if there are differences

1113
01:00:52,360 --> 01:00:57,360
Speaker 1: in um sort of the professional aesthetics of architecture versus

1114
01:00:57,440 --> 01:01:01,880
Speaker 1: the actual preferences like what's good or everyday people. And

1115
01:01:01,920 --> 01:01:03,720
Speaker 1: I was thinking about this because I was just looking

1116
01:01:03,720 --> 01:01:07,480
Speaker 1: at one specific study. Uh, it's a fairly simple example

1117
01:01:07,640 --> 01:01:09,400
Speaker 1: by no means proves the case, but it was a

1118
01:01:09,400 --> 01:01:12,240
Speaker 1: little bit interesting to me. This is a study by

1119
01:01:12,720 --> 01:01:17,160
Speaker 1: Sybil does Here and Maryland Read in Environment and Behavior

1120
01:01:17,280 --> 01:01:21,080
Speaker 1: from two thousand twelve called Furniture forms and their influence

1121
01:01:21,120 --> 01:01:25,320
Speaker 1: on our emotional responses toward interior environments. So, Robert, I've

1122
01:01:25,360 --> 01:01:27,400
Speaker 1: got some images for you to look at. Here. We're

1123
01:01:27,400 --> 01:01:31,760
Speaker 1: looking at pictures of different furniture designs. Some are rectilinear,

1124
01:01:32,200 --> 01:01:35,280
Speaker 1: meaning you've got like straight, clean lines and right angles,

1125
01:01:35,680 --> 01:01:39,720
Speaker 1: and some are curvilinear, meaning that they have soft, rounded edges.

1126
01:01:40,440 --> 01:01:45,960
Speaker 1: Which of these designs looks more hip? Uh? Well, I

1127
01:01:45,960 --> 01:01:47,840
Speaker 1: don't know. That's kind of loaded question, you know, like

1128
01:01:48,480 --> 01:01:51,080
Speaker 1: hip in a way where I like it, or hip

1129
01:01:51,080 --> 01:01:53,880
Speaker 1: in a way where I feel like the predominant taste

1130
01:01:53,880 --> 01:01:59,080
Speaker 1: makers in society would like it architecturally tasteful. Okay, I'm

1131
01:01:59,120 --> 01:02:03,560
Speaker 1: gonna between rounded and straight edge. Yeah, I'm gonna go

1132
01:02:03,680 --> 01:02:05,840
Speaker 1: straight edge. Yeah, I would think the same thing, And

1133
01:02:05,960 --> 01:02:08,360
Speaker 1: maybe not everyone would agree. But my hunch is that

1134
01:02:08,760 --> 01:02:11,560
Speaker 1: the clean lines and the right angles of the rectilineal

1135
01:02:11,760 --> 01:02:15,640
Speaker 1: furniture would be considered a superior design by pros like

1136
01:02:15,920 --> 01:02:18,840
Speaker 1: people who work in design. It looks more modern, it

1137
01:02:18,840 --> 01:02:21,480
Speaker 1: looks more clean, it looks more tasteful. It looks like

1138
01:02:21,520 --> 01:02:23,560
Speaker 1: the kind of furniture you would see in like a

1139
01:02:23,680 --> 01:02:27,439
Speaker 1: cool I don't know, in like some hip furniture store

1140
01:02:27,480 --> 01:02:31,160
Speaker 1: that's selling cool furniture. The rounded stuff honestly looks like

1141
01:02:31,200 --> 01:02:34,840
Speaker 1: something I would see in a doctor's waiting room. Yes,

1142
01:02:34,840 --> 01:02:37,800
Speaker 1: the rounded edges, I think could be conceived perceived as

1143
01:02:37,880 --> 01:02:40,840
Speaker 1: kind of kitchy, right, They don't look like the choice

1144
01:02:40,960 --> 01:02:43,640
Speaker 1: of interior design professionals, or at least you know. I

1145
01:02:43,680 --> 01:02:46,080
Speaker 1: don't know for sure, but that's my guests. But this

1146
01:02:46,200 --> 01:02:51,320
Speaker 1: simple survey found that the images containing curvilinear couches these

1147
01:02:51,400 --> 01:02:54,440
Speaker 1: rounded edges made people feel more of a number of

1148
01:02:54,480 --> 01:02:59,600
Speaker 1: positive emotions. People felt happier, people felt more hopeful, more comfortable.

1149
01:03:00,040 --> 01:03:02,320
Speaker 1: Looking at those kind of rooms and imagining being in

1150
01:03:02,360 --> 01:03:04,600
Speaker 1: those kind of rooms, then they did with the right

1151
01:03:04,640 --> 01:03:08,560
Speaker 1: angled furniture. So I wonder, if this is correct, could

1152
01:03:08,600 --> 01:03:11,120
Speaker 1: a similar thing be true of our buildings? Could there

1153
01:03:11,160 --> 01:03:14,760
Speaker 1: be two issues? Actually, One is that often buildings are

1154
01:03:14,840 --> 01:03:18,400
Speaker 1: designed in a kind of careless, cost cutting way with

1155
01:03:18,560 --> 01:03:22,919
Speaker 1: little attention to aesthetics, and how that those aesthetics really

1156
01:03:22,960 --> 01:03:26,720
Speaker 1: impact our brains and our emotional lives. But perhaps there's

1157
01:03:26,760 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 1: another thing that even when aesthetics have built, environments are

1158
01:03:31,040 --> 01:03:34,960
Speaker 1: taken into account. I wonder if sometimes they're oriented towards

1159
01:03:35,000 --> 01:03:39,040
Speaker 1: some like esoteric design standard that is appreciated by a

1160
01:03:39,080 --> 01:03:41,640
Speaker 1: small group of people who are deep in the world

1161
01:03:41,680 --> 01:03:45,200
Speaker 1: of architecture and design, but maybe not towards the maximum

1162
01:03:45,280 --> 01:03:48,280
Speaker 1: psychological benefit of people who live and work in in

1163
01:03:48,320 --> 01:03:51,120
Speaker 1: and around these buildings. Does that make sense? Yeah, I

1164
01:03:51,160 --> 01:03:57,400
Speaker 1: believe so. For instance, the taste of the individual choosing

1165
01:03:57,440 --> 01:04:00,080
Speaker 1: the layout for an office versus the individual taste the

1166
01:04:00,120 --> 01:04:02,280
Speaker 1: people working in an office, well yeah, I mean it

1167
01:04:02,320 --> 01:04:05,680
Speaker 1: could be that, like a certain thing looks cool when

1168
01:04:05,680 --> 01:04:08,920
Speaker 1: you're designing an interior space, but then it's not actually

1169
01:04:08,960 --> 01:04:12,560
Speaker 1: great to live in. Yeah. Yeah. And and with the

1170
01:04:12,600 --> 01:04:15,800
Speaker 1: sort of like planning an office layout example, I feel

1171
01:04:15,800 --> 01:04:19,240
Speaker 1: like it's such a different world right, because on one hand,

1172
01:04:19,280 --> 01:04:21,200
Speaker 1: someone is saying, this is what I want the whole

1173
01:04:21,240 --> 01:04:23,880
Speaker 1: office to look like. This is the you know, the

1174
01:04:24,080 --> 01:04:27,000
Speaker 1: blueprint of the office on paper, and that's different than

1175
01:04:27,240 --> 01:04:30,920
Speaker 1: the experience of having one particular corner of the office

1176
01:04:31,280 --> 01:04:34,320
Speaker 1: two that is yours or has been assigned to you,

1177
01:04:34,600 --> 01:04:38,160
Speaker 1: and this is where you are working. Um Like, it's

1178
01:04:38,200 --> 01:04:40,920
Speaker 1: just a it's a different viewpoint. One is the broader

1179
01:04:41,000 --> 01:04:43,320
Speaker 1: view and and of course there are other factors as well,

1180
01:04:43,320 --> 01:04:45,600
Speaker 1: like if you're designing the whole office, you might be

1181
01:04:45,640 --> 01:04:48,480
Speaker 1: thinking about that individual who walks in and sees the

1182
01:04:48,520 --> 01:04:50,880
Speaker 1: whole office for the first time. It's more about impressing

1183
01:04:50,960 --> 01:04:54,720
Speaker 1: that individual than than making the you know, the worker,

1184
01:04:54,840 --> 01:04:57,520
Speaker 1: the employee happy. Yeah, this is something I would definitely

1185
01:04:57,520 --> 01:04:59,800
Speaker 1: like to actually hear from architects on what are your

1186
01:04:59,800 --> 01:05:01,840
Speaker 1: thought it's about this? All right, We're gonna go ahead

1187
01:05:01,840 --> 01:05:04,840
Speaker 1: and call this episode, but we will be back in

1188
01:05:04,880 --> 01:05:08,400
Speaker 1: which we will discuss architecture a good bit more. We

1189
01:05:08,440 --> 01:05:13,480
Speaker 1: will talk about brutal, cursed, and hostile architecture. Especially in

1190
01:05:13,520 --> 01:05:15,320
Speaker 1: the meantime, if you want to check out more episodes

1191
01:05:15,320 --> 01:05:16,720
Speaker 1: of Stuff to blow your minds, you know where to

1192
01:05:16,760 --> 01:05:18,640
Speaker 1: find them. Heading over to stuff to Blow your Mind

1193
01:05:18,680 --> 01:05:21,720
Speaker 1: dot com. That's the mothership, that's where the episodes reside,

1194
01:05:21,920 --> 01:05:25,200
Speaker 1: but these episodes reside elsewhere as well. Anywhere you get

1195
01:05:25,200 --> 01:05:27,840
Speaker 1: a podcast these days, you will find us and wherever

1196
01:05:27,880 --> 01:05:31,560
Speaker 1: that happens to be. Uh, just help us out, leave

1197
01:05:31,840 --> 01:05:35,760
Speaker 1: a nice review, give us a nice array of stars,

1198
01:05:35,760 --> 01:05:38,760
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1199
01:05:38,800 --> 01:05:41,320
Speaker 1: It's a great way to support the show. Likewise, what

1200
01:05:41,400 --> 01:05:44,120
Speaker 1: we have a merchandise store still up and running. If

1201
01:05:44,120 --> 01:05:47,720
Speaker 1: you have any holiday uh gifts you would like to

1202
01:05:48,160 --> 01:05:51,680
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01:05:54,960 --> 01:05:59,000
Speaker 1: is probably the best way to spread the word huge things.

1205
01:05:59,040 --> 01:06:02,360
Speaker 1: As always to our sillent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.

1206
01:06:02,720 --> 01:06:04,160
Speaker 1: If you would like to get in touch with us

1207
01:06:04,160 --> 01:06:06,800
Speaker 1: with feedback on this show or any other to uh,

1208
01:06:07,040 --> 01:06:09,680
Speaker 1: suggest a topic for the future, or just to say hello,

1209
01:06:09,880 --> 01:06:12,760
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1210
01:06:12,800 --> 01:06:22,680
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1211
01:06:22,680 --> 01:06:25,000
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1212
01:06:25,040 --> 01:06:27,439
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