ABSTRACT
One of Harry Heft's most significant contributions to science is his role in humanizing ecological psychology, bringing a strongly social and developmental perspective to perception-action. By focusing most centrally on human “ways of living,” he tackles the considerable challenge of bringing a socio-historical perspective to ecological psychology's understanding of affordances and environments embedded within cultures. In doing so, he has grappled with some significant challenges that social psychology and developmental psychology face. Nevertheless, throughout his work, he remains consistent with the meta-theoretical commitments of ecological psychology – no small task in the face of social psychology's use of similar concepts but disinterest in such commitments. This chapter examines Heft's influence in environmental psychology, which includes bringing the concept of affordances into environmental description and offering critical perspectives on trending phenomena, such as restorative environments. Heft's most notable contributions for psychology is of particular focus: the elaboration of a theoretical approach to understanding socially constituted places, stemming from Roger Barker's concept of behavior settings. Throughout this chapter, the authors discuss research they have done in the area of social affordances, affordances of indoor spaces, and restorative environments, much of this inspired by Heft's ideas.
