Introduction

This patent protects a method that can be incorporated into mobile apps and web platforms for analyzing the relationship between people and environment. The method allows the analysis of psychological and behavioral reactions to an explored environment, which can be either a physical place or its digital simulation in virtual or augmented reality. The results of the analysis are provided as charts and maps that recapitulate the behavioural and psychological geography of the place.

Technical features

The innovative method integrates architecture and environmental psychology to assess people’s reaction to an environment in its existing or designed condition: it enables the description of the experience people have in a place, whether it already exists or is only designed. The exploration can take place in a physical or in a simulated place, as the method can be incorporated into mobile devices that support virtual or augmented reality. The method collects a range of psychological (e.g., emotions, sense of well-being, place attachment, identification of symbolic elements) and behavioral (e.g., movements in space, points visually explored, choice of points of interest) information. The analyses automatically provide a quantification of the variables considered, returning charts and maps that represent the environmental elements integrated with the associated reactions. The method tenables to cluster patterns of similar place experiences.
Declared TRL: 4

Possible Applications

• Subjective data collection for space design;
• Analysis of the experience at tourist sites;
• Georeferenced analysis of travel experience;
• Analysis of behavior and experience in workplaces;
• Analysis of well-being in care places.

Advantages

• Collection of reliable subjective data on the experience in a given place;
• Automatic integration of subjective data with environmental variables;
• Spatialized representation of analyses;
• Description of spatialized behaviors representing the average experience of a group of people.