ABSTRACT
For many architects, a crucial aspect of building users is how those people act within spaces and move around a building. In this regard, users are regarded as objects that are to be manipulated. By contrast, the psychological imperative is to consider the experience of people to regard them as having their own subjectivity. Although both perspectives have value, two studies are presented that demonstrate the importance of adjusting the balance towards the recognition that people make sense of their surroundings and act in accordance with that. In one study, different arrangements of seats in a seminar room generated quite different patterns of seat selection. This related to the willingness or, otherwise, of engaging with the seminar. In the second study, individual differences in response to the physical environment are shown to reflect the sophistication a person brings to conceptualizing that place.
