Open AccessENVIRONMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY: THE URBAN BUILT ENVIRONMENT IMPACT ON HUMAN MENTAL HEALTH
Author(s) -
Wang Chen,
Suzaini Mohamed Zaid,
Nurhanisah Nazarali
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
planning malaysia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.232
H-Index - 7
eISSN - 1675-6215
pISSN - 0128-0945
DOI - 10.21837/pm.v14i5.190
Subject(s) - mental health , environmental psychology , urbanization , personality , psychology , affect (linguistics) , population , questionnaire , environmental health , socioeconomics , geography , social psychology , psychiatry , sociology , medicine , social science , economic growth , communication , economics
Growing urban population has increased environmental demands and also affects human health. As the global population becomes more urbanized, there is a concern that it will negatively affect not just physical health, but also mental health. Mental health can be categorized and studied through many different approaches, such as psychology, psychiatry, clinical and sociology. This paper aims to highlight the comparison of mental health of rural and urban dwellers, in terms of environmental psychology (EP) through the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ). A survey questionnaire was distributed to respondents in Petaling Jaya to represent the urban area, and Pontian to represent the rural area. The survey questionnaire was analysed using one-way ANOVA analysis, and suggests a relationship between behaviour and age, but also in relation to ‘living area’ influence that suggests urbanization affects a person’s environmental psychology. The findings suggest that urban dwellers are more prone to certain personality traits that can be detrimental to a person’s mental health.