From the Inside Looking out and the Outside Looking in: Whatever Happened to ‘Behavioural Geography’?

Abstract

As part of the Institute of Australian Geographers' Millennium Project, this article examines the shift of behavioural geography from a cutting edge sub‐discipline to a branch of enquiry that is now much less prominent in mainstream human geography, especially in Australia. Through an exploration of the rationale for behavioural geography, a brief outline of the nature of the work that was done, and a consideration of the critiques of behavioural geography, the paper argues that behavioural geography enriched the discipline in several ways: it was instrumental in encouraging geographers to consider the epistemological foundations of the discipline; it fostered consideration of a variety of philosophical and methodological positions; and it highlighted the need to consider interrelationships between individuals, groups, society and environment thereby bringing into prominence the ways in which shared environmental meanings are contested and negotiated. Behavioural geography might be a term that is used much less than it once was and behaviourally‐orientated research might increasingly find expression in interdisciplinary outlets rather than in mainstream geography journals but contemporary geography is heir to the endeavours of behavioural geography.

Nature, culture, and the work of physical geography

“…It started, it could be argued, with the realisation by environmental geographers that people do not actually behave in the way that the billiard‐ball models of spatial science suggest – this is certainly obvious when people keep rebuilding their houses on floodplains. Geographers who attempted to bring in phenomenological aspects of living (and hence decisionmaking) were designated ‘behavioural geographers’, and these developments led to a humanistic strain in human geography, concerned with the subjective states of human beings (Argent and Walmsley 2009). Building on both humanistic and quantitative trajectories, Harvey (1974) attacked the ‘ideology of science’ which possessed the capacity to enact – rather than purely describe – the material realities of human beings, highlighting the role of unexamined values which underlay research problem selection, formulation and interpretation.…”

Contemporary Social Change as the Context for Geographical Enquiry: Towards a Reinvigoration of the Concept of Place

“…individuals in developed countries are on a kind of “hedonic treadmill”– we keep trying to move forward by earning more and spending more, but this never does much to make us happier’. Further insight into this impasse is provided from behavioural economics, a branch of the discipline that came to the fore about the same time as behavioural geography but which persisted and grew into a distinct entity unlike its geographical counterpart (Argent and Walmsley, 2009). Kahneman, a pioneer of behavioural economics and a Nobel prize winner, together with colleagues, has explained why income has a weak effect on happiness (Kahneman et al .…”

Attitudes to Drought in Outback Communities in South Australia

“…‘Behavioural Geography’ explores peoples’ perceptions and deeper understandings of a place or an environment based on their attachment to that environment (Argent and Walmsley, 2009). In the formative days of the field of Behavioural Geography there was a focus on the ways in which ‘.…”