A consideration of both constancy and change in place attachments, focusing particularly on attachments to a type of settlement as a means by which the U.S. public may maintain the continuity of psychological bonds with places across changes of residence. Empirical evidence suggests that people form psychological bonds with types of settlements, expressions of which are similar to those identified in past research as indicative of psychological bonds with the tangible surroundings of the home, and that residential mobility may be best conceptualized as sustaining bonds, temporary dislocations, reunions, and reorientations in bonds with a type of settlement rather than as disruptions in bonding processes.
This investigation addresses the theoretical analysis of one of the means by which the residentially mobile U.S. public may maintain the continuity of residential experiences despite the lack of lifetime stability of residence in one home place. It introduces a theoretical position that extends past research on the development of psychological bonds with the tangible surroundings of home places to explain the ways in which these experiences may generalize to the development of psychological bonds with types of settlements, or what will be called settlement-identity. This theoretical framework is applied in the context of a persistent dilemma of continued interest to urban scholars; namely, the distinction between city and suburban settlements. Specifically, the usefulness of this framework in explaining people's residential history and mobility plans, and the discriminations they make between the city and suburbs is illustrated by findings from a large sample survey conducted in Denver, Colorado.
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