Environmental Psychology

Running head: ENVIRONMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

ENVIRONMENAL PSYCHOLOGY

Caron Tuggle

Dr. William Chaney

Crichton College

Since October of 2000, working in the Public Works Administration Division for the last eight years; I have observed how the City of Memphis Solid Waste Management, Memphis City Beautiful and The Earth Complex work hard to protect and enhance the public health and the environment. They strive to change behaviors and improve communities by focusing on Litter Prevention and Beautification programs with an additional emphasis on waste reduction and recycling.

While the community/citizens and public works help to recycle to conserve the resources and keep the city healthy and clean, there is some Positive Reinforcement called “rewards”. Positive reinforcement is defined by the presence of a response-to-reinforce contingency. When we love doing something positive or something pleasing for someone else or for ourselves, we are “rewarded”. What we call reward in everyday language is a simplified and somewhat imprecise description of positive reinforcement (W Scott Terry).

Although the city is working on improving the environment through different means and resources, “Environmental psychology examines the interrelationship between environments and human behavior”. Environment defines the term very broadly from natural on the planet as well as social setting, built environments, learning environments and informational environments

When solving problems involving human-environment interactions, whether global or local, one must have a model of human nature that predicts the environmental conditions under which humans will behave in a decent and creative manner. A model one can design, manage, protect and/or restore environments that enhance reasonable behavior, predict what the likely outcome will be when these conditions are not met, and diagnose problem situation.

After solving the...