Stranger in a Strange Land

2. Stranger in a Strange Land Louis G Tassinary, PhD, JD College of Architecture Texas A&M University

3. Plimsoll marks Ph.D (Perception & Cognition) Dartmouth College (1985) Research Scientist (Psychophysiology) University of Iowa (1985-1990) Faculty (Architecture) Texas A&M University (1990-?) NSF PFF Award Texas A&M University (1993-98) J.D. (Environmental Law) Boston College (2000-03) Associate Dean for Research Texas A&M University (2004-?)

4. The Learners Architecture Landscape Architecture Construction Management Urban & Regional Planning Computer Science Tourism and Recreation Science And other miscreants…

5. Is Psychology Required? • Presently, NO. However…. • There is one officially sanctioned elective in one graduate certificate program • Currently fills an hole in the Cognitive Psychology and Computer Science curriculum • New undergraduate course to be offered for the first time this Spring • Perception may become required for undergraduate degree in Visualization

6. Is Psychology Required? • ARCH 677: Neuroscience and Architecture • Course Description • The primary purpose of the course is to provide graduate students in the design disciplines with an advanced introduction to the field of experimental psychophysiology with applications taken primarily from the field of environmental psychology and supplemented with examples from social and cognitive neuroscience. Students should expect to become intelligent consumers of the psychophysiological literature through their exposure to the foundations, principles, and selected applications of neuroscience. The specific content and format of this graduate seminar will be adapted to the interests and expertise of the students.

7. Role/Rationale • Long standing recognition of the need for the professions to be user-centered • Implicitly taught in the majority of courses offered in the curriculum • Over the past four decades books, symposia, journals and societies have been devoted to person-environment transactions.

8. Special Issues • Strikingly diverse backgrounds • Need for interactive and flexible pedagogies • Incommensurable knowledge priorities • Hubris

9. Opportunities and Barriers • Potential to influence future “deciders” • Gonna have to face it, you’re addicted to “guidelines” • The studio as multidisciplinary model • Problem Seeking • Problem Solving

10. Implications for Psychology • Reinventing the wheel • Need for translational research • “Lab to Living Room” • The importance of consensus

11. Preparing for the Future • Reinvigorate Environmental Psychology • Work with the private sector to endow scholarships, fellowships and professorships. • Institutionalize support at the federal level • Bolster collaborative teaching

12. Role for APA • Co-sponsor symposia with • Major corporations (e.g., Herman Miller) • Other professions (e.g., American Planning Association, American Institute of Architects) • Other countries (e.g., National Research Council) • Produce monographs that are accessible to evidence-seeking planners & designers