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INSTINCTIVE PREFERENCE

Interesting though history is, it may not define what modern people want from parks. It would be better, surely, to employ social survey techniques and discover precisely what people do want. A Swedish researcher, Patrik Grahn, has done just this. His survey included questionnaires, sent to 2200 organizations, diaries kept by 40 key organizations, 1600 reviews of park qualities and interviews (Grahn, 1990). After collecting the data, a cluster analysis was carried out. Grahn found that the hundreds of activities that take place in parks could be analysed into eight types of 'park character', as shown in Table 1.

Historic type Park character Activities
Hunting park Wilderness park Hiking, Camping, Excursion
Hunting park   Species-rich park   Observing species, Collecting species
Hunting park   Forest park   Physical culture, Running
Hunting park   Play park   Play equipment, Building, Growing, Animals
Hunting park Sports park Arena sports
Domestic garden Peaceful park Garden studies, Games for fun
Public garden Festive park Social meetings, Togetherness
Temple garden Plaza park Architecture study, Garden design study

Salmon inherit knowledge of how to navigate their ancient routes around the globe. Humans, presumably, are born with a great deal more knowledge. We lack details of what it is, but many of our tastes and preferences, including those in open space, appear to derive from our evolutionary past. William McDougall sought to explain human behaviour in terms of instinct (McDougall, 1908). Later psychologists turned away from the idea, because human behaviour is less stereotyped than the territorial, nesting and courtship rituals that can be observed in animals. Instead, psychologists now refer to human 'drives' and 'motivated behaviour', of which some are conscious and some unconscious.

The principal human instincts are thought to be flight and fear; repulsion and disgust; curiosity and wonder; pugnacity and anger; self-abasement and subjection; self-assertion and elation; parental instinct and tenderness; reproduction and sexual desire; food and water seeking; gregariousness; acquisition; construction. Grahn's analysis draws from the concept of instinct. He argues that in many outdoor activities we relive the lives of our ancestors, and re-exercise their instincts. The types of place we look for are the types of place they looked for. Too often, the town dweller is like a salmon in a fish farm: trapped but with an instinctive longing for endless space. We seek what the Kaplans have described as a 'restorative experience', such as one can obtain in wilderness (Kaplan and Kaplan, 1989). This requires an experience of extent, of fascination, of compatibility and of 'being away'.

 


Date: 2015-02-03; view: 816


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