This Essay will firstly focus on my experience with nature. Relating to my experience of walking around a local unused golf course. The theory which relates to this experience is Attention restoration theory (ART). ART believes there is a type of attention which becomes exhausted and can be restored with nature. In addition, Restorative Components of Environments Scale (RCES) and Ulrich’s Psychoevolutionary theory will be examined to demonstrate how they also relate to my experience with nature. The second experience will focus on the wider environment. Relating to my experience I will explain how defence mechanisms can be used to deal with how individuals act or feel in relation to the environment. In addition, Worthy’s phenomenal dissociation
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The RCES uses a scale to rate how a certain place can make an individual feel. The RCES is made up of nineteen questions using ART’s four components of fascination, being away, extent and compatibility. The Likert response is usually used. Respondents would be asked from what extent do they agree or disagree with the statement being asked. The statements asked are positive reflections of how the location or place make a person feel, scoring highly would indicate a respectable association with the location or place. If I were to undertake this test on how I feel walking around the golf course, I assume I would score high. Referring back to my reflective learning journal of ‘I immediately have a sense of feeling free’, which relates to the RCES statements of; when I am here I feel free from work and routine, free from other people’s demands and expectations and I do not think of my responsibilities (Laumann et al., 2001 cited in Stevens, 2015, p. 348). How I feel when I walk through the golf course also supports Ulrich’s psychoevolutionary theory that is, that people can discover a psychological healing location if it is comparable to that of a landscape where human species evolved. Ulrich (1979 cited Stevens, 2015) believes that individuals initial reaction to nature is an emotional experience which appears to be positive. This has been supported that it is a quick, impulsive …show more content…
I thought I attained my ‘bit’ in helping the environment. I regularly; prepare fresh meals with raw ingredients, recycle, turn lights and the television off and turn the water off when brushing my teeth. However, I now realise my contribution is not enough. I scored fifty-five on the New Ecological Paradigm Scale (NEP) (Dunlap et al., 2000 cited The Open University, 2015) which is just a little above average. The NEP was developed to eliminate the alleged barrier parting humans from the world inhabited. My score was average and I believe this has a great deal to do with not knowing what other contributions I can make, furthermore, any other contributions I make will have a minuscule influence on the wider problem that is damaging the environment. These feelings relate to defence mechanisms which were originally introduced by Freud (e.g. Freud 1986 [1926] cited in Adams, 2015) in his progression of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis highlights the association between unconscious and conscious influences in determining what shapes human behaviour. Therefore, my way of coping with the detrimental impact on the environment is to unconsciously use defence mechanisms. In particular, displacement, taking simple actions, for example turning the water off when brushing my teeth. I assume this is enough to help the environment but in reality, my consumption patterns are not making much of a
The RCES uses a scale to rate how a certain place can make an individual feel. The RCES is made up of nineteen questions using ART’s four components of fascination, being away, extent and compatibility. The Likert response is usually used. Respondents would be asked from what extent do they agree or disagree with the statement being asked. The statements asked are positive reflections of how the location or place make a person feel, scoring highly would indicate a respectable association with the location or place. If I were to undertake this test on how I feel walking around the golf course, I assume I would score high. Referring back to my reflective learning journal of ‘I immediately have a sense of feeling free’, which relates to the RCES statements of; when I am here I feel free from work and routine, free from other people’s demands and expectations and I do not think of my responsibilities (Laumann et al., 2001 cited in Stevens, 2015, p. 348). How I feel when I walk through the golf course also supports Ulrich’s psychoevolutionary theory that is, that people can discover a psychological healing location if it is comparable to that of a landscape where human species evolved. Ulrich (1979 cited Stevens, 2015) believes that individuals initial reaction to nature is an emotional experience which appears to be positive. This has been supported that it is a quick, impulsive …show more content…
I thought I attained my ‘bit’ in helping the environment. I regularly; prepare fresh meals with raw ingredients, recycle, turn lights and the television off and turn the water off when brushing my teeth. However, I now realise my contribution is not enough. I scored fifty-five on the New Ecological Paradigm Scale (NEP) (Dunlap et al., 2000 cited The Open University, 2015) which is just a little above average. The NEP was developed to eliminate the alleged barrier parting humans from the world inhabited. My score was average and I believe this has a great deal to do with not knowing what other contributions I can make, furthermore, any other contributions I make will have a minuscule influence on the wider problem that is damaging the environment. These feelings relate to defence mechanisms which were originally introduced by Freud (e.g. Freud 1986 [1926] cited in Adams, 2015) in his progression of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis highlights the association between unconscious and conscious influences in determining what shapes human behaviour. Therefore, my way of coping with the detrimental impact on the environment is to unconsciously use defence mechanisms. In particular, displacement, taking simple actions, for example turning the water off when brushing my teeth. I assume this is enough to help the environment but in reality, my consumption patterns are not making much of a